An American in the United States?

This may seem like a redundancy. Allow me to explain. During my tenure in the Spanish congregation I've learned that some of the U.S.' southerly neighbors take exception to residents of the fifty states' self-designation: "Americans." Residents of Central and South Americans also call themselves "Americanos" and don't see why it should be an exclusive term.



In fact, technically speaking the Spanish word to describe someone from the United States is "estadounidense" or "Unitedstatesmen." Jokingly, I like to mention to a certain one of my friends from South of the Border that "Americano" is not the only adjective that can cause terminological confusion. He too is an "Estadounidense" I remind him; since the official name of the country we call "Mexico" is "Estados Unidos de Mexico." Touché?


I say all of this to say that, beginning December 8th of this quickly waning year I will be an American (yes, an American) in the United States...of Mexico.


My lifelong dream of attending an international convention summons me there as well as the allure of street food (I know, I know, be careful blah, blah, blah), the only castle in North America to be actually inhabited by a monarch and a capital which boasts the world's second largest plaza (the red square in Moscow being the largest) and more museums than London.


How exciting it will be to see more of our international brotherhood, "la tierra" of many I've met in the last few years and wander as an American in the United States.