Are you the mother?

I've been thinking lately about how I wanted to get some of my thoughts on race and racism out of my head and onto the page. My problem is that every time something comes up, I feel like I have to tell the whole story or it won't make sense.

And since I'm 42, it's a pretty long story.

So I'm gonna take a different path, I'll just talk about stuff as it comes up. Here's what's come up recently.

I live in Piedmont, a little town of about 15,000 people. Our little town has just a handful of black folks, so even though the Oakland (which is five minutes away by foot) is the most diverse big city in the country, Piedmont is very white and pretty darn wealthy.

Yesterday, one of my daughter's school friends and her father dropped by unannounced to see if my daughter was available for a play date. My wife (who is medium brown) and daughter (who is my complexion - uh... almost transparent) were outside in the yard. The girls excitedly agreed that they wanted to have their play together, so the dad looks at my wife and says:

"Are you the mother?"

Really?!? Not "hi, I'm Susie's dad," or "are you Ella's mom?"

"Are you the mother?"

My wife was, understandably, offended by this, as she has spent the last eight years being assumed, by white people, to be our children's nanny.

On the other hand, how do you politely ask an adult you have never met if they are the responsible guardian?

I wonder if white parents every experience this sorta thing? If so, under what circumstances. I know other black women get it. I was reminded of this by the title of a blog that I saw the other day - "Not the nanny."