Shades of gray

So the other day when I was driving the kids to school when we got into a discussion about the MLK holiday (I believe Tehani called it Civil Rights Day) Tehani asked why they had a day off of school and I explained that at one time, there were separate restaurants, water fountains, etc. for whites and blacks. She asked why and I explained that the white people at the time thought they were better than the black people.

I went on to give an explanation about MLK (thinking back now, I'm pretty sure the kids had probably tuned me out by this point) Anyway, some where midway through my intro into the "I Have A Dream" speech, Tehani interrupted and asked "What water fountain would we drink from?"

This wouldn't be so strange other than the fact that Kobe has asked me on several different occasions if he is black (he even asked me once if he was African :) I explained to the two of them that they were brown, not black. Tehani said that she thought that brown WAS the same thing as black. Brown, black, yellow, white--at this point I've decided that being color blind wouldn't be such a bad thing :)

Happy Civil Rights Day!