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I cannot tell you how many times people have said this to me in reference to Little J. I never know how to answer them. I mean, the obvious answer is “Well, he is one of our family,” but then the person who uttered the offending phrase feels compelled to say something like: “You know what I mean!” Then they usually turn red or say sorry or something like that. Then I feel bad, because they really didn’t mean anything by it but now I’ve made them aware of the dumb thing they’ve just said…and meanwhile I’m the QUEEN of putting my foot in my mouth.
I am not anyone who should be putting anyone down for saying something that wasn’t meant to be offensive but, in fact, is. Ask any of my friends. I do this all the time*****(see below for example)
But the funny thing is that I don’t think Little J looks much like “the rest of us.” He has white blond hair and blue eyes and is a Caucasian child. In terms of coloring he somewhat matches my husband and my older son, but except for the blue eyes he doesn’t match me at all. I have dark brown hair and my skin color alternates between very, very pale in winter or sunburnt and freckled in the summer. Little J has this glorious gold skin that only gets more gold in the summertime. (Truth be told, I am very jealous of his coloring).
His body is also very different from his dad’s or mine or his brother’s. Little J is going to be a very large young man from what I can guess. At 4 his feet are the same size as his brother’s were at 5 (and Big J is a tallish boy) and the kid’s chest – well, let’s just say we’re not ruling out powerlifting or wrestling for future sporting activities. He has this wonderful roundish chest and he’s super strong.
So another thing I’ve said is “Hmm. Well, all white people look alike, don’t they?” Which is supposed to be tongue-in-cheek but often offends people in a way that they can’t quite put their finger on.
What do you think? What would you do?
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*****Here’s the most recent really dumb thing that I said:
A couple of weeks ago we were at a gathering with some other families. There were two little girl babies there, each about 1. One of the little girls, Lana, was very well behaved (sweet, quiet, and would play independently but also would cuddle with her mom) but not especially cute looking and the other little girl, Hattie, was gorgeous- a real Gerber baby – but spent the whole time shreiking at the top of her lungs. She wanted this, she wanted that, she wanted up, down, etc. etc.
As always, I was trying to convince my husband that we needed a little girl baby. “See,” I said to him. “If we got a little girl baby she would be quiet like that one.” I pointed to Lana. “But she’d look like that one.” I pointed to Hattie.
This, in front of everyone, their mothers included.
Ouch.
