People talk a lot about the conspicuousness of families formed by transracial adoption. There's no way around it - people always notice you. The white dad with the Asian kids. Sidelong glances at the playground. Furrowed brows at the cash register. It's something one has to get used to in this situation, parent and (moreso) child. So how about when the curious gaze comes from a camera wielded by someone who knows how to make an image that lasts longer than the barely noticeable sidelong glance?

The outstanding Harlow's Monkey blog brings our focus onto some subtly disturbing images of fathers and daughters, in a series of photographs that teeter perilously close to the lurid. Or maybe just topple right over the line. One can't help but wonder what the models feel about the finished products. They're well-composed portraits, beautifully colored, and holy be-[expletive deleted] is THAT what people see when they look at us? Older white man, young Asian girl... you can make the equation.

And now you, like me, can feel icky for a while.

And then there's the dad in China who's just "helped" his 8-year-old daughter run 2,200 miles, from Hainan to Beijing. That's a marathon and a half every day for a little less than two months. She's too young to compete in the 2008 Olympics, but maybe in 2016.

Perhaps it's just that she's an enthusiastic athlete, like he says.

The problem is - with both these stories - that the daughters aren't really speaking freely. We can't know what they're feeling, really. Not for years. Which makes it rather difficult to know that one is doing the right thing. What's the best way to deal with the sidelong glance and the furrowed brow? I imagine it varies from child to child, or, more properly, from small person to small person - and it's something that's awfully hard to talk about until it's simply too late.



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