Happy Apriversary Fools Day, Mom and Dad!

Ahh, April Fool’s Day. A day during the year where offices, classrooms, and locker rooms become the playing field for some of us to play humorous, embarrassing, and well intentioned pranks on each other. A day among the ranks of Halloween, Valentine’s Day, and New Year’s as well as other capitalized holidays. But, this also happens to be the day that my parents happened to get married.

I know what you’re thinking: What self-respecting couple would defame the sanctity of marriage by having it take place on a holiday of tomfoolery and shenanigans? My thoughts exactly at age 3 when I learned of this debauchery. But I also learned that they didn’t choose this day. In fact, they didn’t even choose each other! My parents has an arranged marriage. Just as Fa Mulan was supposed to have in the family favorite, “Mulan”…didn’t work out so well for the matchmaker.

Being born and raised in the motherland they call India, my parents were chosen to marry each other by their respective families solely on the basis of tradition. It was kind of a situation as my dad put it, “A friend told a friend, who told another friend, who told my dad that they know of a girl that I should marry”. They were introduced in December (years shall remain anonymous for protection of my college fund) and three months later the marriage took place. Dr. Shauna Springer writes in Psychology Today that, “Some marital experts would argue that two years is a good amount of time to wait…In some cases, it may be wise to wait three or more years before making a decision”. My parents had three months.  

Though, here is the craziest part; I’ve never seen a happier couple in my entire life and I’m confident in saying I never will.

Weird anecdote, right? Chances are this is not the first, or weirdest, story you’ve heard and you can bet top dollar that it’s not the last. Ohio State is home to over 50,000 individuals and I’m almost positive they’re all not White, public school, young adults from medium-sized town Ohio. Our university prides itself not only on the shear extent of diversity present on campus but the fact that inclusion is just as important. This issue is a matter of cultural differences, ethnicities, academic backgrounds, extra-curricular backgrounds and so much more!

So what’s all the fuss about being so diverse anyway? Why does that make Ohio State so great? Well I can tell you that not all my friends are from the same place, do the same thing, or have the same interests. I’m actually fairly certain that not two of my friends are parallel in any of these respects. But what they all have in common is that their unique backgrounds provide me with a variety perspectives on any number of personal, communal, or societal matters. Also, I’m sure I’m not the only one who wholeheartedly believes that not only are these diverse perspectives enjoyable to have around, but they better us as individuals in ways we could never achieve on our own.

.

I hope I cleared up any confusion about my crazy parents and their crazy parents because to our generation, living where we do, that is far from normal. Our university holds many assets to make you as a student prosper and find your passion so that you may continue to pursue it beyond your education. With a student body this large and a professional staff this dedicated, diversity at Ohio State is not just inevitable, it’s necessary. But there’s one thing that will always be the same when we leave to lead our successful lives as engineers, stock brokers, wedding planners, and astronauts; we’re Buckeyes now and we’ll be Buckeyes for life.