Great perspective

"I'd rather take a thousand small tests than one big test"

Thank you Mona Younes for that great reminder of how lucky we are each and every day.

Food gawking :)

I have a daily ritual at the end of my day. I spend a few minutes engaging in what some call food porn, a term I dislike strongly.

It is one of my favorite websites, www.foodgawker.com

I spend some time going through recent recipes, my mouth watering as I carefully study the culinary adventures of people from all over. I envy two things: their courage to take on new foods and their photography skills. The pictures are out of this world; even a boiled egg becomes a thing of beauty in the perfect lighting.

As I peruse the pages, I bookmark every recipe I want to try. The wish list gets longer each day, too long, I'm afraid, to ever get around to cooking it all. Maybe I should take a break from bookmarking, and get cooking.

Today's adventure in food gawking is a constant reminder of Rehab, often bringing back a flood of memories, reminding me of how our love of food bought us to each other. A recipe for braised leeks reminded me of the time she made a dish of baked leeks, with heavy cream and loads of gooey cheese, and her husband ate the entire tray. "Of course it was good, it was covered in cheese."

Another recipe of rhubarb jam reminded me of her fascination with this bizarre celery looking fruit. I eat rhubarb pretty often now, in the form of my strawberry rhubarb jam, and alhamdulilah it reminds me of her every time.

Mini muffins. Rehab would have loved these, in fact anything mini. Eating a falafel earlier today reminded me of her mini falafel sandwiches.One falafel patty stuffed into a tiny cocktail pita. Maybe the taste was not all there, but in true Rehab fashion, the presentation was fantastic.

Then I found a recipe from a blog called Baked, from the authors of the Baked cookbook she gifted my sister on our road trip to Boston. I loved it so much, I bought it for a friend a few weeks later as well.

Somehow I feel as if Rehab is with me tonight. Thank you for that food gawker.

My struggle with hijab

Stay with me; by the end of this post I hope to have found some peace with my hijab.

On most days (ok practically everyday) I am bothered by it. The extra piece fabric requires more thought to make simple daily outfits, the challenge to dress myself becoming only more annoying. Running to Trader Joe's for a loaf of bread becomes a public display of religion. Blending in is not easy, as I am often the sore thumb sticking out in a sea of blond, brunette and red. And that's just the part on my head. Hijab encompasses me head to toe, my entire wardrobe, and hence the challenge continues.

Come summer, my life becomes even more difficult. Heat and hijab just don't mix. My general unhappiness only increases.

Over the course of my teenage and adult life, I have always been told nice things about hijab. It's your mark of honor as a Muslim. It's an invitation to non-Muslims to learn about Islam. It's a sign of modesty. It protects you from all sorts of things. But here I am 15 years later, and on most days, I still have trouble coming to terms with wearing hijab. So my conclusion is all these people who have told me these things over the years are not speaking to me. That is not the point of hijab, and that is not why I wear hijab.

I wear it because I have to. It is undoubtedly an order from Allah, and we as His subjects have no choice in the matter. I know many scholars have their reasons about why Allah had chosen hijab for women, such as the ones mentioned earlier.
By the way, my least favorite reason for hijab has always been "because it protects us from men." Why in the world would we have to suffer for the intentions and actions of others? It never made sense to me.
My reasoning takes a different path. I believe we have to wear hijab because, like everything else around us, it is simply a test. This is the part where some girls may object, but I hold that we woman are in constant need of vanity. We like to look beautiful, feel beautiful, be told
we are beautiful. We like to have and hold beautiful things. Our confidence, our comfort in situations, and our self esteem is all tied to how we look, to ourselves and to others. I've known simple girls, girls who aren't into the latest fashions, or purses, or shoes, but even those girls have the need to be appreciated.
Being that Allah created us, He of course knew this fact about us. He took what was precious to us, and is testing us with this fact. Just like He is testing the opposite gender with us. Why put so many beautiful woman on Earth, then tell men to behave with them?
So in conclusion: it's just a test.

P.S. The picture is logo from Pink Hijab Day 2011.

The workday

I have been applying to jobs here and there, asking former employers to keep an eye out for me. I have days where I thoroughly enjoy being at home, then days where I am down on myself, feeling like a loser because I don't have a job. Then I quickly remind myself, if I can't find a job, it is surely the doing of Allah who is guiding me towards my daughter and the precious time we have together. Alhamdulilah.

And here I am, for the first time since Jan. 2010, at work. It's not permanent, who knows if I'll even be called back, but I am working an 11-7 shift today at CBS News.

I got the call last night around 9 pm. Even though it was late, and I had plans for Sunday, I jumped on it. You see I have not yet resolved what it is I am. A stay at home mom or a working mom?

Even though it's only one day, I am looking forward to reuniting with my daughter in 3 hours, to see the look on her face. Of course I have left her before, but never for this long. Will she welcome me? Or will she be upset, confused, where could I have gone, left her for so long? The clock hand is simply not moving fast enough.

For all the mommies out there

This is a poem from one of my favorite poets, Khalil Gibran.
Gibran was born in Lebanon in 1883. His family immigrated to Boston, where he began his literary career. Though he was also an artist, he is perhaps best known in the English world for his book "The Prophet."

History lesson is over, here is the poem.


On Children
 Kahlil Gibran

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.

Watch out for the rabbit hole

I'm sure we all know the story of Alice in Wonderland. A young, naive girl who is so curious she falls down a rabbit hole, becoming engulfed in a world of fantasy.

Sounds familiar in our day and age. At some point in our life, we all fall down that rabbit hole. We become curious about something we are unfamiliar with, something we have never experienced, and lean in, hoping for just a taste or a brief touch, only to end up falling in head first.

I've seen it many Muslims around me. It all starts with baby steps, a few innocent moves. In a flash, they are partying, drinking, dating. But they don't know they are doing anything wrong, because the old version of them is buried inside so deep, lost, unable to speak out in protest. And so the fantasy begins, where we tell ourselves to have all the fun we can, pretending that we will not be held accountable.

This is why in our religion we are told to stay away from sins. Even seemingly innocuous acts may be forbidden, as they can and WILL (mark my words) lead to something much worse.

The are many lessons to be learned from this story, which is considered to be one of the best examples of the literary nonsense genre. Another character in the book reminds us "Read the directions and directly you will be directed in the right direction." Wise words Doorknob, wise words indeed. Let's all remember to read the Quran.

April 1st

32. Eh.