One of these is not like the other. That’s what I imagine people think when they see us together. My family. My party of 5. Sometimes I see the perplexed expression on strangers’ faces as they try to fit us together like a jigsaw puzzle with a stray piece that managed to find its way into the wrong box. I am that vagrant puzzle piece. The one that doesn’t belong.

Most people are too polite to say anything. Instead, they furtively glance at us with confusion stamped on their furrowed brows. But some are brazen. The desire to make sense of this incongruent collection of individuals overcomes their sense of propriety, and they boldly ask me, “Are these your kids?”

Of course they are. Why else would I be galumphing through a grocery store with three whiny children in tow? Kids are terrible at grocery shopping. Why would I be running maniacally through an airport terminal lugging numerous bags with a baby strapped to my back and two pint-sized humans at my heels? What kind of masochist do they think I am?

I grew these humans in my belly and pushed them out of my body.

I get why some are mystified. I’m a Black woman who is married to an Eastern European man. And although he doesn’t think so, he is White. The pale freckled skin and frequent sunburns serve as evidence of that. Together, we created three smart, funny, talented girls. The only “problem” is, they don’t look Black. With their olive skin and dark hair, they look more like someone from Southern Italy than someone from Africa.

When their dad is with them, the world makes sense to people. The four of them belong together. Strangers smile at him, comment on what a great dad he is, women find him attractive.

When I’m alone with our girls, I am the help.

People see a Black woman herding 3 quasi-White children around and they assume I must be their hired caregiver. God forbid I ever yell at my kids in public. The looks of concern I get from well-meaning White people…it would be funny if I weren’t afraid they may call the cops and I’d be forced to prove my children are indeed mine. How would I do that anyway? I don’t carry their birth certificates around.

~

Anyone who knows me knows how much I love a good prank, so I get a kick out of messing with strangers as they stare or ask invasive questions. My daughters and I were at a restaurant a few years ago. Sofia was 9, Reena was 6, and Layla was 9 months old. I was playing peekaboo with Layla as she giggled in her highchair while we were waiting for our food. I noticed the diners at a nearby table—two middle-aged White women—staring at us. I looked up at them and smiled.

“What lovely little girls,” the blonde one said.

“Oh, thank you. Aren’t they, though?” I responded.

“They must be such a joy to look after,” said the one with the short hair.

“Such a joy,” I said, sighing, my hands clutched over my heart.

Layla started fussing, a sure sign that she was getting cranky, so I picked her up, reached for the nursing cover, draped it across my chest, and started breast-feeding. I looked up at the two ladies and smiled.

I don’t know what was more horrifying to them, that I was nursing in public or that underneath that thin fabric, a little White baby was latched to a Black breast. I laughed so hard at their shocked expressions that Layla’s little white feet poking out from underneath the nursing cover kicked me in my rib. I was interrupting her meal.

I’ve learned to accept stares and questions as a hazard of being a mom in a multi-racial family. While I do get annoyed sometimes by the overly curious adults, it’s the kids’ reactions that amuse me, particularly when I make an appearance at my daughters’ schools. When they were younger, the other kids in the classroom would stare at me in dismay when one of them would run into my arms screaming, “Mommy! Mommy! Mommy!”

“Is that really your mommy?” one little girl asked Sofia when she was in kindergarten.

“Yeah. That’s my mommy.” Sofia responded smiling proudly.

“Why are you peach, and why is your mommy brown?” the little girl asked.

Sofia mulled it over for a few moments.

“Well. I guess sometimes mommies can grow different color babies in their bellies.”

~

Raising bi-racial, multicultural kids, my husband and I had to talk about race with them when they were very young. Sofia, our eldest, has always been gifted at distinguishing nuances among hues. I should’ve known that she would one day become quite the artist. When she started inquiring about the various skin tones in our family at the age of two, I realized that kids do see color. When she refused to identify with the non-White characters in her books, I became concerned.

Was she ascribing negative characteristics to the Black and Brown kids in the stories? Is that why she’d have strong reactions when we’d point out the similarities she shared with them? We’d intentionally buy children’s books with non-White protagonists, hoping she’d see herself in them; however, she still had an aversion to being identified with these characters.

I was learning that these biases about race had somehow infiltrated her little mind. And if we wanted to make sure this kid grew up without the self-loathing and insecurity that so many of us non-White kids develop growing up in a predominantly White society, we had to be way more proactive. Buying a few books and watching Sesame Street wasn’t going to be enough. We enrolled her in an expensive preschool that boasted diversity—which for our family meant one with biracial children.

“You know what, Mommy?” a 4-year-old Sofia said one day as I was buckling her into her car seat as we left an event at my parents’ church. Her 6-month-old sister, Reena, was in her own car seat beside her.

“I was looking around at the other kids at church and I noticed they all look like their parents,” she said. “Me and Reena are the only ones who don’t look like anyone in our family. We only look like each other.”

“Oh, yeah. I guess you’re right,” I said. “What do you think about that?”

“It makes our family special. I think it’s cool.”

That is the approach my husband and I have had about families. It’s ok that we don’t look alike. Families can be diverse. And that’s cool.

~

The American notion of race confused my Albanian husband from the moment he arrived as an 18-year-old college student. One day 12 years later, in 2010, he was struggling while completing the census forms.

“What am I supposed to put down for my race?” he said. “They don’t have Albanian on here.”

“That’s because Albanian isn’t a race. You have to mark the box that says White.”

“But I’m not White. I’m Albanian. That’s not the same thing.” The idea of mashing all people of European descent into one category didn’t make sense to him. In Albania, he grew up with the notion that Greeks and Serbs were the enemies of the Albanian people, but America was telling him they were all the same.

“To the American government, it is,” I told him. “You’re European. Europeans are White.”

“Can I say I’m Mediterranean?” He was more comfortable with a regional distinction than one based on skin color.

“Mediterranean is not an option. Just check the White box.”

“Fine. I’ll say I’m White.” He conceded.

A few minutes later, I noticed him studying me.

“What am I supposed to mark for you?” he asked.

“Black or African-American,” I said.

“But you’re Ethiopian. That’s not the same thing.”

“In America it is.”

“That’s crazy. Doesn’t the American government know—”

I quickly cut him off: “Why are you complicating this? You’re White. I’m Black. Stop overthinking it.”

“Fine.” He acquiesced.

Moments later, I noticed he’d put down the form and was staring at Sofia.

“What’s wrong now?” I asked.

“I’m Albanian, but I have to say that I’m White! You’re Ethiopian, but I have to say you’re Black!” He was yelling. But I couldn’t tell who he was yelling at—me, the form, or America.

“Okay . . .?”

“Well, what the hell am I supposed to put down for Sofia? She’s none of these things?” At this point, he was not only confused, but he was angry at how reductive the U.S. government’s views on race were.

I had to relieve him of the duty of filling out the census forms.

~

Traveling with the girls has always posed challenges. People expect to see kids with their nannies at the grocery store or a playground, but what in the world would a nanny be doing at the airport with the children she’s paid to care for? It was an incident at Dulles security that compelled me to abandon my maiden name. Until then, I’d never considered taking my husband’s surname. That’s not a thing that Ethiopians do.

We don’t have surnames in Ethiopia. We all have a given name, which is followed by our fathers’ first name. In the U.S., we use our father’s first name as our middle name and our grandfather’s first name as our last name. So just as 4-year-old Sofia had pointed out how in our family, the only person she looked like was her sister, in Ethiopian households, the only people we share last names with are our siblings.

“That is so confusing. How do people know if they’re part of the same family?” my husband asked when I first explained the Ethiopian naming convention to him.

“I’ve met countless Smiths and Jones and Jacksons,” I said. “How do they know if they’re part of the same family? And doesn’t the name Jackson just mean Jack’s son? Didn’t Europeans take a person’s profession or their father’s name or their city of origin and just slap that onto the end of their names? How does that make more sense than me using my grandfather’s first name as my last name? And just because I married you doesn’t mean he is no longer my grandfather.”

“But how do you know if someone is related to you?”

“How would you know if some random Veshi was related to you? Who is Veshi anyway?”

Even my husband didn’t know. So why would I consider discarding my grandfather’s name for a person I’ve never met?

But this encounter at customs quickly changed my mind. When Sofia was 2 years old, she, my mom, and I were traveling back to the U.S. after visiting Ethiopia. I was exhausted from spending 6 weeks trying to convince people that Sofia really was my child. As we approached customs, I already knew I’d be scrutinized.

Passports in hand, I walked up to the officer. I tried to look as “American” as possible, but I realized that the braids I’d gotten just before leaving Addis Ababa weren’t helping. They definitely made me look foreign.

Dammit, this hair was a bad call. Now I look nothing like my passport photo. I thought as I looked down at the picture and tried to recreate the expression.

Even as a civil servant with a government clearance, I still get paranoid going through customs. I have this nervous bubbling in the pit of my stomach whenever I approach the officer. It’s the same feeling I get when I glimpse a police cruiser in my rearview mirror. Something about going through passport control makes me question whether my documentation is real, or whether I’ve unknowingly stashed some contraband among my things. I feel guilty.

We stepped up to the officer and I brandished our passports. I still had that stupid look on my face, but the officer was stoic. He inspected my mom’s passport, then mine. My braids didn’t throw him off. He switched to Sofia’s passport, and his veneer cracked. He looked at my mom, at me and then at Sofia. That’s when I saw that thought flash across his face. One of these is not like the other. One of these does not belong.

“Purpose of your travel?” he growled.

“Visiting family.” I whispered.

“Anything to declare?” He stared at Sofia. Was he asking me to declare something about Sofia?

“No. Nothing.”

His eyes remained on my daughter. My heartbeat quickened. My throat began to constrict.

“Just what is your relationship?” he demanded. “Why are you traveling together?”

My tongue had turned to lead.

“This is my daughter and that is my granddaughter.” Mom to the rescue! But the customs officer wasn’t convinced. He looked at the passports, probably wondering why none of us even shared a last name.

“Do you have any other evidence of your relationship?”

My mom turned to me. “Show him the birth certificate.” I was too flustered to remember the copy of Sofia’s birth certificate stowed in my bag. I fumbled through my things, aware of all the eyes on me. The passengers in the line behind us were anxiously waiting to see how this would end. Finally! I found the evidence that would avert a prison stint for child trafficking. There it was, in black and white. Sofia and I belonged together. He looked at the document closely, stamped our passports, shoved all our documents towards us, and waved us along.

“Welcome back,” he said almost as an afterthought.

“Thanks. You too!” I said as I crossed into the United States of America.

I cringed at my lexical blunder, and right then, I decided—To hell with naming conventions, I’m changing my name.

~

A few months ago, my frugal husband and I went to a mall with our two youngest in tow. He needed a pair of sunglasses that cost more than $8.00. It took some effort to convince him that drug stores and gas stations were not ideal places to buy decent shades.

I decided to get my eyebrows threaded as we were leaving the mall since I was starting to look like I had two black caterpillars attached to my face. My husband and Layla were lagging. Reena and I walked into the store and were greeted by the South Asian brow specialist. She looked from me to Reena and back to me as she directed me towards a chair. Reena decided she didn’t want to wait for me to get my brows tamed, so she left.

“Is that your daughter?” the lady asked.

“Yes,” I said.

Then she looked up as Reena was reunited with my husband and Layla; they were standing right outside the store.

“Oh.” Things fell into place. “She’s mixed. That’s nice,” she said.

I’m not one to shy away from a controversial conversation—so long as the person in front of me isn’t a local, state, or federal officer of course.

“Why is that nice?” I asked her.

She looked confused, so I asked her again. “Why is that nice?”

“I was just saying that it’s nice because she is beautiful and has beautiful skin and hair.”

“Would she be beautiful if she wasn’t mixed?” I asked calmly. I knew that in her own way, she was trying to compliment Reena. I understood that she, an Indian woman, was also from a country with a history fraught with racism and colorism imposed by Europeans. Subconsciously, she was projecting the same standards of beauty onto my child. I wasn’t going to solve racism with this woman, but I needed her to understand that her comment was offensive.

“Oh. No. No. No. That’s not what I meant. I just wanted to say that she’s beautiful.” She was taken aback.

“I know that’s not what you meant. But that’s how it comes across. You should think carefully about how you compliment people, especially if the compliment is going to be based on a person’s race.”

Embarrassed, she apologized. I reassured her that I wasn’t angry. She then wrapped a long strand of thread around her two index fingers and stuck one end into her mouth. I sat back, pulled the skin around my eyebrows with my index and middle fingers, and watched as her head bobbed up and down while she yanked out strands of hair from my face. I paid and left. I gave her a generous tip to say, “No hard feelings.”

When I explained the exchange to my husband moments later, he immediately tried to give her the benefit of the doubt because that’s what he does. He’s a “see it from the other person’s perspective” kind of guy. This is one of the things I love about him. But it also drives me crazy when I’m venting.

“How can she be racist? She was browner than you!”

“I’m not saying she was racist. I’m saying what she said was racist. I’m not even sure she knows that what she said or how she feels about beauty is a result of generations of colonization, of the British making Indians feel less beautiful because of their darker skin. Why do you think skin bleaching is a half a billion-dollar industry in India? You don’t have to be White to fall prey to Eurocentric standards of beauty.”

“I think you’re overthinking it. She was just trying to pay Reena a compliment.”

Just then, Reena, growing frustrated with her dad, chimed in. “Babbi, why don’t you just stop and listen to what Mommy is saying? How would you know what it felt like for her? She’s the one who walks around in brown skin. You don’t know what that feels like. You should just listen and try to understand instead of taking the other lady’s side.”

My husband and I stopped walking and looked at her. Astonished.

“Wow. My 9-year-old daughter knows more about how to be an ally than I do,” my husband said. He looked sheepish. “You’re right, Reena. I’m sorry. I don’t know what it’s like to walk in Mommy’s skin. I shouldn’t have tried to excuse what that lady said.”

He and I exchanged a look of pride.

~

A few weeks ago, Layla, now four years old, and I were walking through a park near her preschool.

“How much do you charge an hour?” someone yelled. I looked around confused. No one was around except for Layla and me. Then I saw the woman sitting in a black SUV.

“Excuse me?” I said. It’s not the kind of thing I expect to hear in a park in Bethesda.

“What’s your hourly rate?” she asked.

“What are you talking about?” I still didn’t understand.

“How much do they pay you to take care of her?” She pointed at Layla.

Layla was looking up at me, confused.

“I’m her mother!” I snapped.

“Oh my gosh. I’m so sorry. How embarrassing. I didn’t mean to...”

Layla and I walked away as the woman continued to apologize.

A few moments later Layla asked, “Mommy, why did that lady think you weren’t my mommy?”

I was too stunned to explain. “Oh, don’t worry about her. Let’s get some ice cream.”

~

Before Layla was born, Sofia and Reena used to joke about how our family of four looked like the perfect s’more. I was the chocolate, their dad the marshmallow, and the two of them the graham crackers. They loved s’mores, so were thrilled by this comparison. I thought this was hilarious because they were right.

These days, if someone other than a federal officer asks, “Is that your mom?” they respond, “I’ve never met this woman before.”

They’ve also learned that the best response when people ask, “What are you?” is, “I’m African.”

Then they laugh at the looks of confusion. We do belong together.