"I don't like brown.."

First meeting between Arielle and Evalie: Evalie was a few hours old.

I felt a sense of panic as my daughter uttered these words the other night! I knew she did not mean it in the way she complains of anything I put on her that isn't pink and frilly, I was sure this time she meant color..brown skin color! It wasn't as straight forward as I make it sound, it was evening time, after dinner and we were getting ready to head to bed. I had been watching The Voice earlier on and off and just happened to put it back on when a brown skinned contestant named De'borah came on to sing (..quite well actually) and because Arielle never stops singing, I asked her what she thought about the girl singing..her response, "I don't like her, I don't like brown". I was a bit taken aback, I wondered what she meant, the girl wasn't wearing brown and what did brown have to do with her singing anyway? So I pressed her to explain what she meant by this, she wasn't really into the conversation so I reminded her gently that I was brown and so was her grandma and in fact she was brown ( at least 1/2) too..she asked "Is daddy brown?" I said "No, he's not". So, as I rattled off people who were "brown" that are part of her family, she eventually said, "I love you because you're my mommy and I love everyone in my family". So I quickly texts my older sister who also has two mixed race daughters and asked if she had had to deal with this in the past? She suggested to ask her more specifically if anything had happened which made her feel like she didn't like "brown" people.

The next morning, while getting ready for school, I asked her about what she had said the night before and she didn't really seem bothered by it. She just insisted that she didn't like "brown" not because of anything..her teachers name is Ms. Brown but she's not, she has one brown skinned girl in her class who she says she doesn't play with, so basically the only "brown" people she interacts with are myself and my family. I'm not sure what else to do, I've addressed it but I'm not sure I was able to clearly articulate that all people should be treated equally regardless of their color and how do you even convey that to a four year old?. And more importantly, I am really conflicted because I feel bad..slightly offended, I deal with this everyday, when I am out alone with Evalie, people often remark "that's a really cute baby" they assume she isn't' mine because she looks completely Caucasian maybe except for her curly black hair, when Arielle is with me and calls me mommy people are a bit less surprised because she's a bit darker and has long, extremely thick curly hair. 

Once again, I'm faced with trying to identify and explain her place in a world of black and white as a mixed race, mixed religion child. I know she thinks she is white and Catholic but she isn't and I have to find a way to make her proud and confident that she is both because its going to be more and more relevant as she grows up, while her religious affiliation may be less so. Any thoughts?