Interesting Encounter

Yesterday Michael and I ran some errands, taking Finn with us and leaving Kevin in charge of the other kids. We stopped at the grocery store to pick up a few things and one of the checkers there who has come to recognize us came over to me to admire Finn (I usually don't have him with me when I'm there). This is the same grocery store where "Linda" works. This other checker was really looking Finn over and oohing and aahing over him, and I knew without a doubt that she was trying to determine if he has Ds, I'm guessing because she works with somebody who has Ds. She was very nice and I was totally okay with it, but it made me sad, this barrier between us, neither of us knowing what to say. There was a part of me that just wanted her to come right out and ask me, "Does he have Down syndrome?" but I completely understand how uncomfortable that is - I, even as the parent of a child with Ds can't bring myself to come right out and ask another parent this question when I suspect their child has Ds. And, too, there was a part of my that wanted to just blurt out to her, "Yes, he has Down syndrome." But that would have been weird and uncomfortable, too.

So instead, she said how beautiful he is and we both smiled a lot, and we parted ways without asking/saying what we really wanted to.