Ambassador Ortiz: Lessons from a Life of Service

3: Into America’s Front Line Trenches: Passing the Exams and a Special Mission to the Sudan

A medical discharge from the Air Force allowed me to come home to continue my TB treatment regime. I went out to the ranch to recuperate between treatments. Since I was immobilized, I used the time to read War and Peace, The Remembrance of Things Past, Don Quixote, The Education of Henry Adams, and many other great books that I had always wanted to read. I read and read and my condition improved steadily. During this time I also did some deep soul searching. My hope had been to be a doctor in Santa Fe, but the experiences of combat duty, the plane crash, and my prolonged and painful illness prompted me to take a different tack. I also was moved in no small measure by the loss of so many friends in the war and by regrets about my role in destroying cities and killing people. I concluded that I had to do something to make the world better. My first impulse was to be a missionary priest—a thought that brought with it a ghostly pat on the back from Grandmother Alcaria. But I was twenty years old with strong hormonal surges and I knew I wanted a family. It didn’t take me too long to decide against being a priest, but I had to think of something else to do to “save the world.” About that time I read a book about a diplomat who, through his service, helped resolve conflicts peacefully—an approach that seemed  3 Into America’s Front Line Trenches: Passing the Exams and a Special Mission to the Sudan more sensible than warfare. That inspired me toward the foreign service and in —about two years after my catastrophe—I applied to the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service. My acceptance at Georgetown confirmed for me that my education in the Santa Fe Public Schools had been excellent. Georgetown was a wonderful school with the finest Foreign Service program in the country . Resolving to go there was one of the best decisions I ever made. The school challenged me rigorously. There, as in Santa Fe, I was fortunate to have extraordinary teachers who had a significant impact on me. From my great professors Carroll Quigley and Jules David I learned that a good education is being made aware of what you don’t know. I was doing very well at the university when I decided to take the Foreign Service exam to become a U.S. diplomat. It’s a very tough exam. I signed up for it in my junior year, thinking that I would take it again seriously the next year. I had learned from my experience in the flight simulator during basic training for the Air Force to give things a trial run first, before the real test. I was so relaxed while taking that test that I whizzed through it. When I didn’t know the answer to a question, I just moved on to the next. I didn’t sweat over it. If I wasn’t sure of the answer, I would risk a guess. The test lasted three days. I zipped through the multiplechoice questions and took my time with the essays. I chose Spanish for my foreign language. To my amazement I passed the exam—not brilliantly but I passed it. I also passed oral exams before an intimidating panel of senior Ambassadors. The State Department invited me to enter the Service right away, skipping my senior year at Georgetown. I could have done that, but my college degree was more important to me—a priority I learned from my parents and also imparted to my children. When I did earn my degree from Georgetown, I again could have begun working with the Service immediately. But I had a strong urge to travel, especially to Europe. I saw that the time was ripe, before committing myself to a career. My friend and classmate Bill Leonard was of the same mind, so we planned a European tour. Just the prospect of a summer in Europe filled me with unbridled joy.  INTO AMERICA’S FRONT LINE TRENCHES My first stop was Spain, where I studied Spanish—the King’s Spanish—while Bill was in England. The Spanish experience turned out to be very worthwhile, with much of the payoff to come years later, when I worked on Spanish affairs for the Department of...