Is he yours?

Yesterday, K and I had to run to the market to pick up a few things for a bread recipe. As we we're using the self-checkout lane, the cashier who was assigned to watch over the self-checkout registers came over. She looked at K and then looked at me.

"He's beautiful. Is he yours or did you adopt him?"

I don't know why I still get taken aback when I get approached with a question like this. Perhaps I think that as a society we should have come further along then to assume a woman with dewy, pale as snow skin could be the biological mother of a brown-eyed, black-haired, olive skinned child. Or maybe it's just amazing to me how people have no fear prying into other people's lives and asking personal questions. Of course, I quickly blurted, "he's mine." But later, I reflected, even if he had been adopted, he'd still have been "mine." I'm the one who nurtures him every day through life, teaching him the skills he'll need to change the world for the better. (Of course, D has a huge part in that as well.)

But it brings me back to the whole audacity thing, and how people ask the most astounding questions. I remember when K was about four months old. My sister and I were shopping and he was being the content child he usually is. An older women stood their admiring him. (Yes, he's always been a big lady-killer.) She turned to me and asked, "Is he from Korea?". Of course, I was quick on my feet that day and responded, "No, but his father is." Then she proceeded to tell me about her son and daughter-in-law and how they were in the process of adopting some children from an Asian country. Of course, I was stunned that she could ask me that question -- and I'm not sure if she pulled Korea out of thin air or if it were pure luck. I wonder, if she'd asked me if he was from China or Japan, would my response just have been no... or would I have been snarky and said something different.

Of course, it doesn't just happen to mothers of children of dual ethnicity. If you're single, people are always asking you, "So, dating anyone?" "Found Mr. Right, yet?". If you do find a Mr. Potential, then the questions turn to, "So, when are you getting married?" (Seriously, I remember people asking me and D that after we'd only been dating a few months!!! - And we waited 3 years to get married.) Of course, the day you walk down the aisle, yes, the very same day - they begin to ask you "So, when are you going to have kids?" I had to endure two years of that question. And of course, you can guess the question I get asked now (outside of if my son entered the world from my birth canal or somebody else's) "So, when are you going to have number two?" I just smiled and say, oh "When K turns 18." That at least shuts them up for the time being.

Now, let's look at these questions - Found Mr. Right? (What if I'm a lesbian?) When are you getting married? (I don't even want to go there...) When are you going to have kids? (What if we'd been trying and found out we couldn't, or we'd had multiple failed attempts after spending thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours being poked and prodded?)

I just wish the world could be a little more sensitive and think before we all speak. If I can teach my son one lesson a day, that would be today's lesson.