While America will always, I think, feel foreign to me, New York City is my home. This is where I can construct my own identity freely and reject labels imposed on me.

...being Latino means being from everywhere, and that is exactly what America is supposed to be about.

The tension between people is palpable, and the ideal of what it means to be and look American becomes a preoccupation to folks around the country, including me.

I guess it all depends on whom you ask and when you ask. Race, I've learned, is in the eye of the beholder.