On June 12th, 1967, in Loving vs. Virginia, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down anti-miscegenation laws that were still active in 16 states at the time, that had barred marriages between "whites" and "non-whites". My parents couldn’t marry when they wanted to in 1947. They were in Japan, but they couldn’t have gotten married even if they had been in California. What a crazy world, treating people like they are so alien that they have to be separated legally by something called race. Thankfully my parents had the courage to defy social and legal constraints and stayed together with the help of my Japanese grandparents who embraced the stranger, welcoming him into their Tokyo home, demanding only respect. And that's how I got to be here!