Definition of life in the United States is elusive

CHICAGO — I thought this moment would be easy. That after almost 4 months of traveling throughout the United States I would have a clear and well-defined picture of life in this country, of its people and their sets of values. Instead, my mind continued to struggle to put together the pieces of this complex puzzle that is often reduced to the term “American culture.”

What I discovered was an enormously diverse and sometimes contradictory society in which beliefs and behaviors may differ widely from one state to another, and even from one individual to another.

I found a nation where people can express themselves freely anywhere, anytime — whether by participating in massive demonstrations or by hanging solitary banners outside their homes — but where the number of rules governing their social behavior can sometimes seem endless, stretching from restrictions on public smoking and drinking to regulations on sexual conduct (the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision on sodomy in Georgia being just one example).

I found a nation that is many nations in one, a country that embraces people from everywhere in the world regardless of their color, religion or political affiliations. At the same time, I discovered that the low-wage jobs are done mostly by minorities and that racial tensions are still strong and visible in many places. A simple walk in the abandoned white neighborhoods of downtown Detroit is enough to confirm this impression.

I found a country that is over-sensitive and even paranoid about security, packing its public buildings with X-ray machines, metal detectors and whatever might protect them from external attacks. Meanwhile on the domestic front, the number of people carrying guns continues to skyrocket, gangs still impose their violent laws in the streets of some major cities and the U.S. has by far the highest homicide rate of any developed country.

Skyscrapers and squalor

I found a nation that spends millions of dollars to rebuild another country but has thousands of its own citizens living in the streets and 11 million of them with no health insurance. A country where the breathtaking skyscrapers of Chicago and New York, the fortress-like houses of California and the beautiful Victorian mansions of Michigan are only a few miles away from poor and sordid buildings.

I found cities that “never sleep,” where the fast-paced, hectic life is the only one its residents can imagine. And I found a full, orange moon and silence on a farm in Minnesota, where families pray before meals and share Sunday barbecues with their neighbors in town.

I found a consumer-oriented, materialistic and individualistic society, but one that at the same time has an extraordinary number of private foundations and nonprofit organizations that strive to help people, groups or even countries.

I found a land with the largest amusement park one can ever dream of, the widest variety of bars, theaters and entertainment facilities, and the most beautiful parks popping up right in the middle of cities. But I also found people with barely no time to enjoy them, working long hours with little vacations.

I found people that are proud to be American but who sometimes seem to prefer to find their identity in a certain state (Texas), sports club (Chicago Cubs) or church (Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta.)

Oh, the list of impressions seemed endless. And I still didn’t know whether Americans could be classified in any of these categories, or in just some of them or in all of them at the same time. But what I did know for sure was that when it comes to “American culture,” there were no valid stereotypes.