Feelings. Nothing more than feelings.

So, my naturalization oath ceremony is now history. I still have difficulty expressing my feelings about it. I feel there's a lot of emotional baggage attached to this subject, and in turn don't feel too comfortable blogging about all of my true feelings, or even writing a publishable piece about it. It is a great subject, however, that I think will be interesting to many.

The general belief by everyone is that naturalization is a dream for those obtaining it. All I can bring myself to say without too much difficulty is that it was not a dream for me to become a naturalized American citizen, as much as it was a logical step I felt I should take to open doors and opportunities for myself since I've spent 20 years of my life here. I appreciate what this step offers me for my future, so I'm not unappreciative of what I've received, which is truly the most any country can offer an outsider. I feel truly welcomed and I thank all those who congratulated me and went so far as to attend the 5-hour ceremony, and give me flowers to celebrate the day.

I'm looking forward to the chance to vote in this upcoming election, and I look forward to having an actual say in issues affecting me as a resident of Colorado and the United States of America. But truth be told, I don't feel any more American than I did before Wednesday, May 28 of 2008.

I am still me, an Iraqi living in the United States of America, keeping my heritage, language and culture alive no matter what a piece of paper says. But I am also someone who's lived over half of her life in Denver, Colorado, USA. I ended my elementary school career and moved onto middle and high school right here. I went to the prom, I went to college and made great friends who shared these moments in my life and still do today.

In a sense, I suppose I have been an American citizen these last 20 years. But having it on paper makes it a responsibility, rather than just something I naturally adapted into. They told us this at the ceremony after all 1800 of us were naturalized and sworn-in... they told us to never forget where we came from, or our heritage. They told us that our different backgrounds are the fabric of what this country is made of. I didn't need to be reminded of that, but it was good to hear it.

A big day at the Colorado Convention Center

For those of you unaware of, or not up to date on my immigration status, today has been a very emotional day for me. I became an American citizen in a very special naturalization oath ceremony. I make it a point to say it was special, because it was apparently the first and perhaps the only time the state of Colorado will host such a large naturalization ceremony, involving some 1,800 persons from 120 countries at the Colorado Convention Center.

This day has been a long time coming.

I originally applied for citizenship back in August of 2004, just three months before my green card was set to expire. I submitted fingerprints, completed an interview with immigration, and even passed the citizenship test with flying colors by November of that same year, only to be shuffled to the bottom of an endless pile of citizenship requests. I spent four years in limbo, way outside of the processing time frame stipulated by USCIS (the new and improved name for INS). Just an FYI, the time frame is 180 days, total.

Anyway, during the four years in limbo, I'd call every six months or so and get the same answer... that my case is pending FBI background checks. Meanwhile I'm hearing about people getting their citizenship finalized within the 180-day time frame, while people in the same boat as me were making waves by taking their cases to lawyers who demanded that the USCIS get moving on the incredibly delayed FBI background checks. Several newspapers were reporting on the subject, and I read most of them. I was beginning to not feel too bad, and let my patience take care of my frustration. I used writing as an outlet, and gained great feedback and relief.

During all of this, of course, I had to keep going back ever so often to renew my green card extension, which was stamped into my Iraqi passport. I was able to travel with this extension, so though my green card had expired back in 2004, I was still using it to its full capacity in 2008, thanks to the extension.

Even though I had passed my citizenship test and done everything required, I was beginning to lose hope, and all but gave up on getting an answer at all. I was happy enough just renewing my green card extension with a simple stamp. I was happy, and USCIS was happy. It worked.

Then one day, things got a big push forward. I don't know what triggered it, but the FBI must've dug my case out from under the pile and thought: "She's waited long enough. Let's have mercy on her and conduct that pesky little background check." I got a letter requesting I go in for a second session of fingerprinting. I went in to get that done back in April. By mid-May, I got a letter stating that my citizenship request had been approved, and to wait for an oath ceremony notice in the 30-90 days. I was happy just with that, and expected the longest possible wait of 90 days to hear about my oath ceremony. And finally, the oath ceremony notice arrived. It hadn't even been 30 days since I got the approval letter... I was ecstatic. I told my family and closest friends about the big day.

Now the big day has come and gone, and I have no idea how I'm supposed to feel. Writing is an outlet of feelings and thoughts for me, but I still can't express the mix of emotions inside of me right now. Maybe it's because I'm tired, or maybe because I'm still a little in shock from how fast everything happened... it was like bam bam bam!

I'm now an American citizen.

Am I happy? Yeah. Am I sad? Yeah. How did I expect to feel? I don't know.

That's about all I can say about my feelings at this time. I wanted to blog about it to let everyone know about my news, but a more formal piece describing the experience in more detail will have to wait until I get my feelings sorted out. Right now I'm running on almost no sleep, and "What just happened?" mode.