You’re not American, are you?

Salah M. Abed,
Moses Lake, WA.

I grew up in small towns in the Pacific Northwest; I quickly got used to being the only Arab-American. Every day somebody would ask me, “Where are you from” or “What are you?”

This variant came from one of the first people I met when I moved to the town where I currently live. That’s when I realized that what people were really asking me all my life is, “Why aren’t you like the rest of us?”