My Uncle Steve, Aunt Miranda, and cousins Reneé and Lauren are in town visiting. Uncle Steve is The Colonel's brother. Before I go on, I must again swear to you that I don't make any of this up. That said, Aunt Miranda is from Hong Kong and thus my cousins are half-Chinese. She and my uncle married when they were in their late 30's. So all through my early 20's, she was very concerned that I not wait as long as they did to get married. We had conversations that went like this:

Aunt Miranda: (With a thick Chinese accent) So, Cach... you have a girlfriend?

Cach: Umm, no, Aunt Miranda, I don't.

Aunt Miranda: Really? That's too bad.

Cach: Oh, I'm sure I'll be alright.

Aunt Miranda: You like Chinese girls?

Cach: Sure, I do. I like all kinds of girls.

Aunt Miranda: Oh, good. I know 3 or 4 Chinese girls would be perfect for you.

Cach: That sounds great, Aunt Miranda.

Aunt Miranda: Okay. You come to China. I make all the arrangements.


Now that I'm happily married, she's completely satisfied. In fact, she keeps telling The Colonel and my uncle to stop bugging me about when we're having kids. Aunt Miranda and I always have amazing and hilarious conversations. She is a deep deep soul with an awesome sense of humor. At their wedding, the following story was told about how she and my uncle got engaged:

Uncle Steve: Well, when you're a single American male in your 30's in China, you're pretty popular. I had a few girls who were interested and pursuing me, but Miranda was just more aggressive than the other girls.

Aunt Miranda: That's not how I remember it.


So tonight, she and I have a great conversation about race, racism, cultural identity, American race issues, interracial marriage, and interracial children. Then she told this funny folk story that the Chinese tell about race:

Aunt Miranda: People are like cookies that God bakes. The white people were take out of the oven too early, so they not done enough. The black people were left in the oven too long, so they done too much. But the Asian people were in the oven for perfect amount of time. We get nice and brown. And think about how many people there are. Most people Asian. God got it right most of the time.

I laughed for a good long time after that one. Enjoy the cachinnations, folks.