The writer on her parents’ interracial marriage during the Civil Rights movement:
“She remembered only a time when a taxi driver refused to pick them up. They were with her parents, and my grandfather was outraged by the slight. A Jewish Ukrainian immigrant, my grandfather held high ideals of justice in his adopted land. He took down the taxi’s medallion number and found a police officer to stand with them until they could hail another cab. A few months later, he took the offending driver to court. My mother couldn’t recall what had come of the charge.
“‘That’s it?’ I said.
“My mother’s eyes narrowed. She looked surprised by my disappointment.
“‘I mean, it must have been hard dealing with what people thought,’ I said.
“She didn’t hesitate in replying: ‘If we’d cared what other people thought, we wouldn’t have gotten married.’”
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