by Maggie Downs posted in Life

I still get jokes about it even now, three years into being a mother.
Sometimes it?s by people who know me only through Facebook, the people who have seen my wedding photos and vacation photos. Sometimes it?s people who have met my husband at a social gathering. Some are people who barely know me at all. In all cases, they?ve seen my husband -- and then they get a look at our kid.
?So who?s the father"?
This is almost always accompanied by a visible sizing up of my child. I see the scan of my son?s skin, eyes, nose, hair, and then I watch the gears turn. His ethnicity is a puzzle. I understand what prompts the jokes, but that doesn?t make them hurt less.

My husband is Asian. Our son is too, by virtue of genetics -- but he doesn?t have the features that fit with preconceptions of what an Asian looks like. It?s the same issue with my husband, who is Japanese but appears ethnically ambiguous. That means when we?ve gone to a Chinese restaurant together, a table full of customers has tried to give him their orders. (That?s happened more than once.) He?s been called Jackie Chan (wrong ethnicity), Daniel Dae Kim (wrong ethnicity), and Toshiba (not even a person). He?s a teacher, and some of his students have been so blunt as to ask, ?What are you"?

Our son, on the other hand, is also ethnically ambiguous but looks more Caucasian than anything else. His hair is light, fine, and wispy; in the sunshine it looks red. His eyes are stunningly...