He (Toe) Walks in Beauty

Well, the R.A. finally got the big break in his modeling career that he'd been waiting for.  He's going to be the cover boy for his school's newest brochure.  Frankly, I don't know if the R.A. got the coveted cover because of his fresh faced looks or because it was the only shot the school had of a student that didn't look confused or p.o.'d.  My husband, on the other hand, was positively thrilled.  The other morning he said to me, "Do you think they will have the new brochures ready for Sunday's autism walk?"  Seeing as they only took the photo roughly about 12 minutes ago I told him I didn't think so.  Honestly, the man is beside himself with excitement.  What does he think - that there will be modeling scouts from New York and Paris casing the autism walk for the "Next Big Thing?" 

I was amazed that they were able to get a decent photo of the R.A.  Most photos we have of the R.A. look like something out of "Ghost Hunters" as he's usually portrayed as a blur.  The few still shots of him are not that flattering as he looks angry yet confused.  We have this one photo of the R.A. that we refer to as the "What the FU#*?!" picture as that is clearly what his expression is saying.

I will say, and I say this completely objectively, in person the R.A. is remarkably adorable.  Although darker like my side of the family, no one ever says he looks like me.  Oddly, many people say the R.A. looks like my brother.  I know, creepy weird, right? 

I confess this sort of disappoints me.  The R.A.'s sister looks very much like her father. She was his "mini me" piping hot straight from the womb.  My husband has been stopped by people he doesn't know who say, "You're KiKi's dad."  In my case, when I would take my blond haired, blue eyed infant daughter places, people would coo over how beautiful she was and inevitably turn to me and say, "And this is....?"  My mother used to say they probably thought I was the nanny from Ecuador.  When my mother and I would be out with the baby I told my mother people probably thought we were the housekeeper and the nanny taking out the boss' kid. 

One day I just snapped.  My daughter and I were at Friendly's and right on cue, after fawning over the baby the waitress asked "The Question."  I responded that I was indeed the baby's mother and that I had adopted her from Sweden as everybody knows all the best babies come from Scandinavia.  As far as what was hot in international adoptions, Scandinavian babies were the new Chinese babies.  Unfortunately my snarky sarcasm was lost on the waitress who listened attentively to me.  She probably went home and knowingly told her family, "China's out.  Sweden's in."

Once my daughter started talking and publicly referring to me as her mother, "The Question" stopped being asked.  People now just assume she's adopted.  I am sure by the time she's a tween she'll be telling people that anyway.