Europe and the G8

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America always seems so boring after I get back from a foreign diplomacy mission. Sometimes that's a good thing, like when I spend some time in one of the more violent parts of the world. "Interesting" is often synonymous with "dangerous" in the political realm. But Europe? Man, they've got style there. As much as Americans like to go on about how big and powerful the White House looks, the truth is that it's bland and puritanical next to any old palace in Europe. I go to England and France, the place is chock full of incredible mansions with intricate exterior designs and lavish interiors. If Westminster Abbey is the Waldorf Astoria, then the White House is a Holiday Inn.

But it's not just the buildings. There's so much history and cultural certainty in Europe. The French know what it means to be French. The English are certain about what it means to be English. It's in their food, their homes, their music. It's even in the damn air.

This has all made me take a step back and ask, "What does it mean to be American?" I know I probably should have asked that a long time ago and it's surprising that I haven't asked that until now despite essentially having to think about all the constituent pieces non-stop for the past three years. All the same, here I am, thousands of miles from my nation's shores, just one leader among many from countries that were ancient when the country I lead was just a glimmer in John Adams's eye. Here I am, and I wonder.

The stereotypes of Americans they accept here in Europe would be easy to fall back on, but they're just not true, at least not universally. That boisterous, loud, over-confident and infinitely provincial yahoo of myth isn't America. Maybe it's Texas, but not the whole country. By the same token, the money-driven urbanite or the white bread suburbanite are just a reductive piece of the puzzle. Hell, in any given American lifetime an individual can assume all those roles and more. Where's the cohesion? Where's the French table where an erudite Parisian can sit with a scruffy Alsatian and agree on the primacy of a hand-crafted Bordeaux? Where's the roadside pub where a London businessman can find his inner lad along with the country boy when they both love the same football team?

Maybe that's the core of it. Maybe, under all the regional squabbling, to be American is to be in constant transition. We're a revolutionary people. Our politics thrive on unseating whoever's in power, our business revels in competition and our education system is predicated on rankings. We're all of us forever pursuing something bigger and better, even to our own detriment. There is no satisfaction in America, no accepting that there's unlikely to be fame or a big pay day for the average man. So, what does it mean to be American? It means either never knowing who you are or always trying to be someone else.