The head-spinning, magical moment of becoming an American citizen

“Congratulations. You’re an American citizen.”

I was in the Federal Building downtown when an immigration official said those words to me. They caught me by surprise.

I thought I was supposed to hear them in a big naturalization ceremony, the one with hundreds of people, where they say how many different nationalities are represented and everyone cries. Not here, in a small, slightly cluttered office.

“No, we stopped doing those during Covid, and it’s pretty much stayed that way," the official explained. "You can go downstairs and take the oath here.”

“That’s so great!" I said giddily. "You see, I love America!”

Those words came to me spontaneously, from a deep unacknowledged place. I was finally joining the tribe after living here with a green card. I hadn’t had time to prepare, to ready myself. So this was a raw, unfiltered reaction. And it surprised me.

I do love America though. While I’m now a dual citizen, of both the U.K. and the U.S., my love for America runneth over.

I love its can-do spirit, its freedoms, its willing acceptance that the pursuit of happiness is so important it’s in the constitution. That’s crazy! In the U.K., pursuit of happiness would be ranked slightly lower, probably below the right to complain about the weather, or the joy of standing in line (nothing better for the British soul).

But happiness — as my British grandma once said to me — who said anything about happiness?

Flags everywhere

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Suzanne Levy/LAist

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I love the essential sunniness of the American psyche. The feeling that anything can happen if you so will it. That tradition doesn’t necessarily get in the way of innovation. That the future is wide and beckoning, and while the past got us here, it doesn’t necessarily show us the way forward.

Striving for an ideal

It may not manifest itself every day, or for every person, but there’s a striving here, an ideal.

In Britain, it’s rolled up in the symbol of the monarchy, of whom you are a subject (stated in your passport). But there’s no written constitution in the U.K. Just thousands of years of history. And while Brits know they like to play by the rules, value fairness and root for the underdog, it’s just not spelled out the way it is here.

Brits also don’t pledge allegiance to anything, and certainly not in the mornings at school. On my daughter’s first day of school, over a decade ago, everyone, parents and children and teachers, stood together in the playground with hand over heart and recited the Pledge of Allegiance. I was shocked. It was just so … naked. Overt.

But that day, listening to the words, I realized that you pledge allegiance not to a person, but to a republic. One nation, indivisible. It seemed impossibly noble, romantic and moving.

It still felt very strange though. Not something I could see myself doing.

At least not then.

There are thousands of ways to feel American

You don’t just flip a switch internally when you become a citizen. Boom, one minute you’re British and the next you’re American.

I’ve had to feel my way through it. Wait, am I really American? Do I feel American? Should I somehow love apple pie? Buy a cowboy hat? Love football? (The American kind. Whoops, an American wouldn’t say that. Must work on that.)

It’s an individual thing, I know. There are naturalized citizens who proudly walk around with the Constitution in their pocket. Others who thrill at the endless choices in the supermarket. Or the astonishing right to wear athleisure wear whenever you get the urge. Myriad versions of identity.

Taking the oath

After my immigration interview, I was sent down to the first floor, to an area with a few rows of seats which looked and felt like an airport gate.

There were about 30 of us, from different countries in Asia, Latin America, Eastern Europe and the Middle East. As we sat, and people started chatting in their native languages, I marveled. How can all of us, with different cultures and backgrounds, now call ourselves American? How does that happen? And how can a country be built around such an idea, stretching back to my English puritan forebears?

I saw one man still clutching his revision notes for the civics test, written in a language I didn’t recognize. Armenian? Farsi? It was extraordinary.

Somehow all these people had decided that there was something better here than in the country they’d grown up in, brought themselves over, and begun a life from scratch.

In all the talk about immigration, legal and illegal, that drive is still astonishing, one that Americans born here take for granted.

We were all asked to stand, raise our right hands and take an oath of allegiance to the U.S.

This wasn’t the Pledge of Allegiance, which I’d by now carefully learned. This was different, a solemn oath, asked of all naturalized citizens. To defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and take up arms if asked. It was somber and affecting. And while it wasn’t the big ceremony I’d expected, everyone cried.

When I got home, my husband asked what I wanted for dinner that night to celebrate my new status. I asked for meatloaf and mashed potatoes, my favorite American meal. It was delicious.

Yes, I should have had apple pie and ice cream for dessert as well. But becoming an American takes time, people. And I was still going to have a bath and a cup of tea. Habits die hard.