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For a new American, this is the dream

By SUE CARLTON
Published December 14, 2007

So I'm standing in the back of the darkened Tampa Theatre thinking possibly the sappiest thoughts I've ever had as a reporter.

Since my work-related subjects generally center on things like crime, death, disaster and politics, I rarely find myself in a room with this much hope in it. I'm watching nearly 500 people officially become Americans. People raise right hands to renounce any foreign prince or potentate, their voices a mix of accents and no accent at all.

Then comes a music video (hey, what's America without a little MTV?) and Lee Greenwood's hyper-patriotic song about being proud to be an American. You're starting to think, sheesh, until you see that a man in front of you is crying a little as he sings along. And when Greenwood belts the line And I gladly stand up next to you and defend her still today, the whole place spontaneously does stand up, all these grownups unabashedly waving tiny American flags.

Some read the words to the Pledge of Allegiance from their programs while their raised-in-America kids recite them without having to think about it. Many kids are here to watch, a little girl in a white confirmation dress, two boys in Spider-Man T-shirts trying not to squirm through the boring parts. Then President Bush is on the screen, and this time "My fellow Americans" means these people too.

In all the hugging and camera flashes afterward, I meet Jose Lopez, who left El Salvador 10 years ago and works for a shipping company. I ask if this country was what he thought it would be. "Better," he says.

Now his oldest daughter speaks English better than even he does, but he wants to be sure they always have Spanish too. "It's who we are," he says.

A young woman from Nicaragua named Judith Garcia, wearing scrubs for her dental assistant job, tells me Sept. 11 clinched it for her. "This will be my first time to vote," she says. "I can't wait."

We talk about the test she took as part of becoming a citizen, questions on the Constitution, who wrote the national anthem. At the end she was to write this in English: The Statue of Liberty was a gift from France, a sentence she says she'll never forget.

More than one person looks petrified at the idea of talking to me with my notebook and pen. Then I meet Raghu Yerrajenno, who wears bookish glasses, works in software and can't seem to stop smiling. He and his wife are from India, and he talks of voting, a passport. "A dream come true," he tells me.

Gail Stanton, who is from Belize, says, "This is better than my wedding day," and her husband laughs with her. Their son, Taylor, has one of those smiles he hasn't quite grown into, American as a 7-year-old gets.

A woman in a sari takes a picture of a man by a Christmas tree. People pose with a cardboard Lady Liberty (the gift from France) set up for the occasion.

Anti-immigration types might look at all this and say, see, this is how it's done legally, and haven't all these good people managed? Others who think this country should continue the rich tradition of open arms would see affirmation in these faces too.

Finally, everyone spills out into the sunshine, where downtown construction workers gape and a city's grit blows by. And for today, being American is enough.

[Last modified December 13, 2007, 23:43:06]