How We See Ourselves

A United Europe that would be closest to heaven would be one that had Italians as lovers, Swiss as organizers, French as cooks, Germans as workers, and English as police.

The converse: a European state of hell would have Italians as organizers, Swiss as lovers, French as workers, English as cooks, and Germans as police!

The truth of this well worn chestnut is that every country and people has an upside and a downside. These are usually opposite faces of the same coin.

Let's leave aside national stereotypes for a moment to focus on the qualities themselves. The traits that make one an exciting lover (surprise, serendipity) are at the other end of the spectrum from those that make for a good organizer (dependability, predictability).

How does this apply to the two countries that make up North America? The upside of the United States from independence on, has been a buoyant optimism: its "yes, we can" spirit.

This applied from its beginnings, in building a society on an ideal from the ground up. It applied to a Revolution against the world's greatest Empire, and to reconstruction after war.

It applied to misconstrued military adventures as well as to change like the Civil Rights Movement. Martin Luther King's "I have a dream" speech was a statement of "Yes, we can."

It applies across partisan boundaries: to the feel-good presidency of Ronald Reagan, the naive optimism of the Bushites that they could remake the world, and now the explicit "Yes, we can" of Barack Obama's Democrats.

There's a downside to this optimism: that of a gambler on a roll: he doesn't known when to stop.

The inveterate optimist cannot understand caution or criticism as positive attributes, and tends to see them as criticism: "You're either with us, or you’re against us."

In boundless goodwill to remake the globe after world wars, to bring democracy to an eastern kingdom, the optimist can't imagine anything else than being welcomed with open arms.

This is the US swing between internationalism and isolationism: between a global crusade and retreating to Fortress America. The downside of the optimist is disillusion.

Americans see themselves as amigos: the world's friends and fixers. When this doesn't work, they can become bitter. Witness the pique against countries who refused to join them in Iraq. Instead of being seen as friends and allies with different interests this time, they were "those who didn't stand beside us."

Canada's upside and downside are also opposite sides of a common trait: one that's reflected in the meaning of its name: Kanata in the original aboriginal tongue means simply "a village," "a group of huts," "a meeting place."

Canadians have been a meeting place almost since the beginning. They can talk to people on opposite sides of issues who wouldn't be seen talking to each other.

For a few years before President Nixon opened the front door to China, Americans and Chinese spoke to each other through Canada as a back door.

Before the Pearl Harbor, Canada served as a bridge between Britain, who was in World War Two, and America who was not.

After the War, Japan's Crown Prince travelled through Canada to attend the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. To come through the US was still too sensitive because of Hiroshima.

More recently, bilingual Canada became a bridge for French speaking Africa to access North American technology in French.

Canadians can talk to stolid Ukrainians and to laid back Californians. The two regions are a world apart, and Canadians have connections with both.

The downside of this apparent congeniality is that Canadians can be seen as formless or spineless: unwilling to stand up for ourselves.

This motivates the perennial challenge to express a Canadian identity some claim does not exist. A recent Quebec Premier alleged that "Canada is not a country."

In the sense of a people with fixed boundaries, he's right. Canadians are ever- evolving, having never been forged in the crucible of revolution.

The meeting place and the amigo, the ideal and the perennial accommodator, have much to give each other. In sitting together and in standing up for principle, in ideals and accommodation, humankind can experience both Freedom and Connection.

Vive la différance! Vive le rapprochement!