PenWomanShip

Pelagia Szymanski trembled as she sat in the examiner’s office. The female official looked over her granny glasses at Pelagia and asked, “Mrs. Szymanski, why do you want to become an American?”

The bent, frail Polish woman with the porcelain skin and coarse black clothing lowered her babushka-covered head, and spoke in broken English. “Is good to have beginnings in new country like America, no? In Krakow, Polska where I come from, is fear and forcing people to swear oath of allegiance to Germans. This I never do. I come here instead in 1870 with Mama and Papa. It was long, hard trip. My Mama had to sew our krona into her fur hat. It was all the money we had, but there were so many bad people on the ship, those who steal. We do anything to come to this country.We will be free here, yes?”

The female official shuffled papers on her desk, making a sharp, crackling sound, like dry wood about to burn. “That IS the idea, Mrs. Szymanski. Now let’s have you concentrate on the history questions you were given to study for your citizenship exam. You DID study, didn’t you?”

Pelagia answered, “Yes, Missus, my sister help me to study.” She remembered when Tecla prepared her for the test questions.

“Tecla, it is hard, this test.” Pelagia wiped her brow with the hem of her white apron.

“I know, I know, but you must do this.” Tecla’s face wrinkled as she spoke. She looked at Pelagia’s trembling hands as she wiped her face. “They not always ask same questions, Pelagia. Maybe they not ask this time you there “what is legislative branch of American government, but if they do, what will you answer?”
“The congress?” Pelagia offered in a tiny voice.

Tecla’s face beamed. “Yes, yes, my darling sister. You are right!”

Pelagia blushed and bent over the potatoes to be peeled for supper. The two discussed fifty more possible test questions, until Pelagia threw up her hands and said, “No more! I pass or I don’t, but this is enough.”

Her sister, Tecla strode to the window of their tiny apartment in Milwaukee and looked out the window. The Kosmoski children were playing in the dirt and rubbish heap. Then she turned to Pelagia. Her mouth was set and hard. “You see that Danya and Pieter Kozmoski down there? They were born American like their mother, Gertrude. They take for granted they never lose being U.S. citizen. They don’t learn their government, take country for granted, their grandmother Olga say. We must never do that, Pelagia. That is why I learned the questions and became a citizen, and why I help you now.”

The other sister, Pelagia cried. “Enough, enough, Tecla. I kiss this ground, see?” She knelt on arthritic knees and bent to kiss the old wooden floor of their apartment. “I kiss this holy ground, Tecla. Freedom is holy.” She steadied herself by holding on to a chair by the table, and rose.

Pelagia passed the test, and when it was over, she made the sign of the cross and said for all to hear, “Thank you, Jesus, that you have blessed me and set me free. I am American now.”