She sure looks familiar...

During class on tuesday when we did the little 10 question quiz, I found myself categorized somewhere right in the middle. And as all the students hurried about trying to find partners who were the opposite extreme to themselves, I found myself bunched with all the middles who all basically scored the same thing but were beaten out by people who had more bias sided answers. So as i stood in front of the class with almost every other student who also like me scored a 4, i began to question the point to this assignment if it meant that there was not enough people in the class who had opposite view points. I then found a girl who look familiar as if i had seen her somewhere around campus before, and although her score to the quiz was a 3, i was lucky to have found someone with a different score in the sea of leftover 4's.

The familiar face happened to be Sami Dubbin, a petite redhead who was very approachable and friendly. We agreed to meet the next day at coffman in between our classes for the day at 11:15. We got jamba juice and after searching coffman for open seating to have our conversation and coming up short, we sat outside on a picnic table since the weather was beautiful outside. The conversation started out friendly, just a little chit-chat to break the ice. She gave her recommendation to me about whether or not i should take anthropology next semester, and we established why we both looked so familiar to one another. Turns out she lives in the same dorm as me, and her roommate and my roommate are close friends, and they had introduced us once before.

Learning more about Sami's background, I learned that she went to Wayzata high school where she has held a number of jobs. When it comes to the work force, she has had a lot more experience and variation with her jobs. I have had the same job since the beginning of high school, and she has had four. When the conversation started turning more into the direction of jobs, labor, unions, and the point of the meet and greet, i soon realized how wrong i was to assume that the same score in a class quiz meant that we would have the same opinions. Sami was part of a union. Her first job was working at Lund's grocery store, where she explained to me that as part of her job description she had to join the union. Although technically you can not be forced to join, she remembers being told that if she didn't sign up to be in the union then they would not employ her. After leaving Lund's and the union, her next job was working at a small exercise gym called The Edge. After that she did some nannying until she landed the job she still currently possesses at a party place for kids called Pump It Up. The grocery store was the only union she had ever been involved in. So lucky for her, she has had the experience to work both in a union, and not in a union. Because of this, it has formulated her opinion to be pro-unions.

Being in the Lund's union was in her eyes beneficial. She was happy how it made her feel equal in the store, and how her hourly wage was considerably higher than minimum wage. Although being only a high school student while working there excluded her from all the other benefits such as healthcare that the union provided, her family history with unions partaked in those missed benefits. I learned that Sami's Grandfather was in the carpenters union where he was an avid supporter of the union and still today shows his support and loyalty to them. Sami has seen firsthand the positive outcomes the union has had in her life, and she sees from experience herself and from her grandpa what benefits the union can bring in a person's work life.

From hearing about her family background and history it was there where i realized that Einstein was correct when he said that "no two opinions are alike." I was skeptical to the assignment because i was not able to find a partner who had an extremely different number in a tiny quiz, and because of that i thought that our opinions in the matter were going to be similar. But to my utter surprise i learned that i should have eaten my own words. Each person has their own life stories, and backgrounds with their family, and life experiences. And it is because of these experiences that each person formulates their own opinion about matters such as unions. Sami has had 4 times the amount of experience and knowledge pertaining to unions, which is why she was for them, while i find them unnecessary. Experience is the best way to gain knowledge, and it is our history and our past that embodies what we know and expect and think about the future. I am so glad that I got Sami as my partner!