The basics of every citizenship exam are the same. There’s an English-language test, a civics/history quiz, and a rapid-fire set of questions about whether the applicant has ever engaged in human trafficking, kept someone from practicing their religion, or served in a foreign army, among other transgressions. For months, my wife and I spent our evenings preparing. When the day comes, I find myself as nervous as I thought I’d be. There’s a kind of anxiety that kicks in whenever one has to submit to the whims of a system that can alter the trajectory of one’s life. A sense that things only have
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