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Guatemala
It´s always interesting traveling out of country, and seeing as a matter of fact how others view us, the United States.
And in a sense, it´s possible to make a case that we shouldn´t really care how others view us. Not be affected by those people but keep our own counsel, both personally and as a country. Keep a positive outlook, don´t let others drag you down, stay the course.
But it is possible that once in a while, it´s good to check on that external view. I have been wrong more than once in my life when I thought I was right, and it wasn´t until someone outside my own perspective brought it to my attention that I even considered my actions to be in error.
We, the group I´m traveling with, visited a Mayan ruin today, marveled at the ancient workmanship, wondered at the culture that created these long-dead edifices. We shared a moment or two of reflection on the top of one hand-wrought, moss-covered mound of shaped rock, and were joined in that reflection by some Guatemalans present.
They thanked us for coming, for the idea that we would come to care at all, to help as we could, to notice that they existed, to see them as people. One young man mentioned that our president had recently visited these same ruins, and after he left the Mayan priests performed an ancient ritual to cleanse the sacred grounds from what our president and the current administration represented to them.
Most of us Americans still see the United States as the light on the hill, a shining beacon. The light has dimmed for much of the world, the shine is tarnished. Guatemala means little to the U.S., that´s true. What some Mayan priests think and do don´t really impact either our policies or our perception of ourselves.
But it should give us at least some pause. It should give us some reason to consider how far we have fallen from what we could be, that a nation as unimportant to the great United States as Guatemala should have reason to cleanse its sacred ground when the leader of our nation sets foot on that soil.
My heart ached when this young man spoke. My heart ached, because I had met him last year on a similar trip, and I knew him to be a good man, caring and honest, gentle with his words and with others. And this is what he would say about the country whose heart I yet love.
On ´Conversations´, the radio show Terry and I have the good fortune to broadcast on KZUM on Tuesdays, we had a caller from France who voiced similar concerns, that the United States has lost its way. And I know many of you who read this column will look down your nose at France, but our relationship with France is old and deep, rooted in our own fight for freedom two hundred years ago, and France´s fight to survive in two world wars. It is no small thing to fray a friendship like that.
Nor is it a small thing that neighbors to the south of us, small, poor and weak, would even take the trouble to cleanse sacred soil from the footfalls of our leader.
I write this from foreign soil myself, missing my own home, wanting desperately for the United States to be the best it can be rather than settling for the easy path to ruin charted by a hundred empires before.
Roger German's blog can be seen at www.commonsense.typepad.com
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