Under the heading of Kids Say the Darndest Things and Sometimes You Have to Tell People
My great-niece and her husband have a five-year-blonde son I’ll call John. They recently adopted a five-year-old son who is black. I’ll call him Bob. The boys are best buddies and call each other by name: “Brother.”
When other children told them they couldn’t be brothers because their skin is different, they displayed proof they’re siblings: their matching sneakers.
The Darndest Thing:
A couple of weeks ago, the family took a road trip. They were making the very long drive home when John announced from the back seat, “My butt hurts.”
Bob remarked, “My butt doesn’t hurt. That’s because black people have big, squishy butts and white people don’t.”
I told their mother that when Bob meets the rest of her family, at least some of us a couple of generations back, he’ll change his mind about white people’s butts.
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I have permission to share this story. I changed the names so as not to embarrass the principals in case future girlfriends run across the post.
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Kathy Waller 