I knew nothing much about Guatemala. Central America. Nice climate. Mayan Empire. Sugar cane, mangoes and coffee beans for Starbucks. A huge supplier of child adoptions for American families. Probably could find it on the map without much looking.

This all changed two weeks ago when I actually went there. My life changed then, too. But before I tell you that story, I need to back up into 2007 …

… to a time when my dear friend Cathey told me all about her trip a year earlier. I know she has a huge, caring heart – and especially for children, and she’d hooked up her skills as a pharmacist with a team of medical folks, all of whom spent a week in rural Guatemala providing free medical and dental care to people who typically have none. She told me what a big impact that trip had on her life. She showed me pictures. Then out of the blue she challenged me to go on the next trip.

Call it an adventurous spirit; call it divine guidance; call it crazy – but I’ve found that sometimes in life decisions don’t need to take a long time. About 35 seconds in this case. My heart led the way, and I signed up to be part of what would eventually become a team of 32 Americans, from Tennessee, Alabama, Kentucky and Oregon (don’t even ask me how Oregon got in there – it’s just that kind of place!), flying off to Guatemala. Nurses, doctors, a dentist, a pharmacist, a factory worker, a retired guy, a photographer (and hi tech wizard), a couple of preacher’s sons, and me – a writer.

So despite the gigantic title of this blog, I can promise you right now that it isn’t going to be a travelogue of all the cool places to visit and sights to see in the country of Guatemala. National Geographic isn’t funding a single page (though they were thoughtful enough to include an article in the February ‘08 edition: see “Mexico’s Other Border”).

And as beautiful as things looked from the airplane, the Guatemala I saw could better be described with words like dusty brown, smelly, polluted, poverty stricken. Not a pretty picture. That is unless you’re one of those wonderful people who regard reaching out to people desperately clinging to the bottom rung of life, complete with diseases, rotten teeth, little hope, and surviving one meal to the next, as pretty.

I had the very good fortune of spending eight days of my life with 31 souls who do.

So read on – but at your own peril, knowing that your life may never be the same. I know mine won’t. I wouldn’t have it any other way …