I looked at my sweet boy who seemed to be transforming before my eyes. His bouncing curls had all but disappeared, and his course hair now only yielded a hint of a wave around his cowlick. His ankles peeked through the bottom of his jeans that are now two inches off of the ground, and he…
I had big plans to drop my son off at preschool and come home to a freshly brewed pot of coffee and try to write something funny, poignant and thought-provoking for this month’s KINDRED. Perhaps something about how I want to teach my biracial kids to own who they are and speak up for themselves,…
“What I hear when I’m being yelled at is people caring loudly at me.” – Leslie Knope Every toy that my husband, Akash, picks up with a sigh hits me like a mini, personal, attack. My own insecurities kick in: Another one you missed? Why is it so hard just to put things back…
After I graduated from high school, my mom shared that she had cried herself to sleep every night during my senior year. I was angry that we had moved away from my childhood home in Phoenix to a soulless suburb of Seattle, and I acted out in typical but relatively harmless ways—smoking cigarettes on the…
“Mamma, are these daddy’s socks?” I continue to stuff crumpled up tissue paper into the recycled gift bag, pretending like I don’t hear. Maybe he will get distracted, and I will be spared. “MAMMA, ARE THESE DADDY’S SOCKS?!” No such luck. I sigh and turn around. I feel like a teenager who has just sneaked…
Kindred 