“Will we have to get a new passport?” one asked. “What if I don’t want to be English?” another said. Their fondest memories, it turned out, were of the free flow across borders — of the speed of belonging rightfully in the E.U. line at Heathrow Airport and being able to move from culture to culture without being labeled an “alien.”

The bedtime story of the American dream and the European Union that had held such an enlightened allure suddenly seemed like perhaps a pipe dream, and the Canadian dream — of what Justin Trudeau called a “postnational state” — took on the halo of recognition. As did Mr. Trudeau himself, with his “because it’s 2015” answer when asked why half of his cabinet appointments were women (a Duh! phrase that had the same magnetic appeal to BuzzFeed-addicted didactic preteenagers as it did the rest of the internet). The promise of a better future had emigrated north.

Remember when everyone was muttering about moving to Canada if Trump won? David and I could see our kids’ ears prick up when it came out of Lena Dunham’s mouth. Because while they understood such statement-making was mostly a metaphor for dismay, they also realized that for them it could be an actual possibility. They pretended to joke about it. Kind of.

We didn’t move. But Canada has become a point of pride for our children.

Over the summer, the Olympic swimmer Penny Oleksiak practically became a meme in our conversation. During the recent Stanley Cup playoffs, our 14-year-old daughter watched every evening with my husband, and reeled off stats for Sidney Crosby (the Pittsburgh Penguins’ captain, who comes from Nova Scotia) and Connor McDavid (the Edmonton Oilers’ captain, from Ontario). Her favorite team in the league is the Montreal Canadiens, and her second-favorite team is the Toronto Maple Leafs. When she was given an Islanders jersey after watching a game with a friend, she picked Wayne Gretzky’s No. 99 for the back. When her middle school class was competing in a “grade Olympics” that included a floor hockey competition, she put “O Canada” on the sound system. She later said she thought credit should go where credit was due. She is about to spend three weeks in British Columbia.

Our 16-year-old has just gone off on a 52-day canoe trip through Quebec to Hudson Bay that she has been dreaming about since last summer. (She had a countdown clock as the screen saver on her laptop.) At a recent high school rowing championship, where all sorts of souvenir T-shirts are sold, she expressed a desire for a Canadian national team tank. In a discussion of what colleges she might apply to, she dismissed the idea of British universities entirely, but American and Canadian schools are still on the list.

Her little brother is canoeing eight hours north of Toronto. Not long ago, he acquired two T-shirts advertising the local highway poutine shack by his grandmother’s weekend cabin near Alliston, Ontario, which he proudly wears around school. He took a picture of himself on the Brooklyn Bridge wearing his Just Judy’s Chip Wagon shirt and an enormous grin, sent it to the woman who runs the stand, and she posted it on her Facebook page. The image shows a little bit of Canada in Brooklyn.

Though he might think Brooklyn in Canada was more like it.

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