Yes Ma'am, praying, and cleaning

Well good morning.

So much has gone by in the last couple of months, I can hardly comprehend it all. I'm not about to list them all, because this semester has wrought so many changes, I have no idea where I would begin. So, I'm just gonna talk about the last three things that I've considered blogging about, but just didn't have the time to do.

YES MA'AM!

Apparently, I have a problem with saying 'yes' too much, or 'no' too little. I never realized I had this problem, before. Actually, it's almost as though, if I do not say yes, I am failing myself. I understand prioritization. I truly do. There are times where I will say no to people, and it will be like cutting off my left pinky toe, something that isn't really needed, but heavily painful. My problem is, that I will overload myself with so much work, and constantly tell myself "think of it as a temporary challenge" or "you know you can handle it", or something equally as 'motivating'. In the end, I can handle pretty much everything life throws at me. My friend growing up used to interpret the verse 'God does not burden a soul more than it can handle' as to meaning that sure, God will only dish out to you, what you're capable of. But humans can take on more than they can handle, and that's when it gets burdensome. So, maybe I'm taking on too much, maybe I'm not. The thing is, regardless of how much I take on, I feel like I always still have time for my family, friends, work, and acquaintances. I never feel like I don't have any free time. So, what's one more project in a string of projects. My friends (and sister) have told me I need an intervention... But I REFUSE... see, I can say 'no'! okay, okay, maybe I need to say no to people, but I see this as 'conditioning'. The more I can handle now, the more I can handle later. Or, actually, more accurately, the more I do now, the less I have to do later. I truly believe that. So, if I can handle so much, and still have time for my loved ones and alone time.... does that mean I'm saying 'yes' too much??? I think it means, that I am taking on exactly enough. I will never give up family time, friends time, community time, and alone time. I believe in giving each their right. So, yes... I can say 'no'.... but I say yes, a lot too.... but it boils down to what I am saying yes to.



What am I saying yes to? Well, anything that has some potential value that can be nurtured. Research, yeah okay. Hanging out with friends, okay. Reading 15 novels in a row, okay. Watching a marathon, okay. I just do things. Sometimes I do a cost-benefit analysis. I mean, I was going to work on a HUGE international research project last summer, and in the end I decided not to, even though I got accepted. I said no to pharmacy school, my #1 college choice, even though I was guaranteed a spot when I applied like 6-7 years ago. There are so many things I've said no to. I say no to injustice. I say no to abuse. I say no to oppression. I say no ignorance. I say no to inaction. There is so much I say no to every day, and in lieu I say yes to other things.

So, maybe I don't have a yes or no problem. Maybe, what I have is a 'letting people know how much I am doing' problem. Maybe, if I can handle so much, I don't have to tell people about my decisions... Just do things, regardless of telling people. My mom doesn't need to know that I went jogging that morning. My sister doesn't need to know I vacuumed the house. My brother doesn't need to know I bought the cat food. My coworkers don't need to know that I volunteer at different places. My dad doesn't need to know about my latest research project. My friends don't need to know about the newest political book I read. and so forth.

But then, what do you talk about? If everyone is giving updates, or asking you questions, what answer do you give? hmmmmmmmm..... I'm not really sure. Do you withhold information, so you don't have to hear people's thoughts about your actions? Or do you say what it may be, so that you share a piece of yourself with the people surrounding you? I honestly don't know. These thoughts have been revolving around my head for the last couple of weeks or so, and clearly, they are cyclical in nature. :X

Okay, well if you have any advice on that one, please post!

--

So, I said 3 things. I posted the first which was about the yes/no stuff... It ended up being a lot longer than I initially intended, and I try not to edit my posts. I let them be a stream of thought, just as my brain normally works. Anyhow, my second thing to post about.


Morning Prayers

I was at the mosque for the morning prayer last Friday, around 6:45am. With me were two other sisters. One of African descent, I believe from Ghana and another of South Asian descent, I believe from India. We were standing in the women's prayer hall, silently following the congregation. It was beautiful. Three women from three different backgrounds, in three different age groups, with probably three totally different mentalities, praying together in silence. It was a delicate, divine, and dazzling experience. The imam's voice wrapped around us, deep, reverberating, calm, almost a sense of serene stillness. We were being led in the motions of prayer, and it was utterly beautiful. I don't know how else to describe it.

---

Need to clean.

I have never realized how much of a clean freak I am.




Ever since my mom left the country, I realized how much she did to keep the house together. She would do things, like vacuum daily, and we would tell her, mom you're over doing things. Lo and Behold! I am sweeping daily, because the house just gets that messy. I'm coming to realize, after living with 4 other roommates, that people aren't necessarily as clean as you are, they have higher tolerance to messiness. And when you have a family of your own, you need to train and delegate those cleaning tasks to your children from a young age, to normalize the cleaning process. That is, if you don't want to live in filth. But most of all, you need to lay out your expectations and standards to those who you are currently living with (whether they are parents, siblings, or roommates). They need to hear what you have you say; similarly, you need to do the same. Recognize, each others values and standards of comfort and try to accommodate each others' needs, without overly sacrificing your own.

So, roomies, if you're reading this.... I am about to bring it full force for the new semester. I cannot live in crumbs... I just can't. My sanity and productivity depends on it!

So, those were my three posts, combined into one....

Enjoy!

oh and HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

feline to feline

Good Morning...
So, my brother brought home a cat about 3-4 weeks ago. He did so after the whole house was asleep, and we awoke to a new family member. At first we thought he was insane, but then I remembered how probably 12-13 years ago, my sister and I did the same... But that cat, Hurayra (which in arabic just means cat) left home... never to return. Well, our new cat, her name is Dora is 3 years old and a Bengal cat (i think).. I know nothing about cat breeding, but according to my brother it's some sort of pure breed thing going on... like I care about breeding? As long as it has hair and it's furry, who gives a flying toothache??

Anyway, so in the beginning, she avoided us like the plague. In fact, she was so scared, she hid out in places that took us forever to find her. Now, she's grown to recognize us as her housemates... no, not owners, but housemates... Clearly, she has a will of her own. Anyway, her name is Dora, because she's a very curious cat... So curious, in fact, that she paws at my bedroom door, just so she can explore my bedroom, which is closed all week long. Well, the reason for that is because, well, yes, you've guessed it, I'm ALLERGIC to cats. And my genius of a brother loves to torture me with cuteness. So, well in the beginning everything was okay. The cat would stay out of my way, and run scared of her new housemates. Now, though, she's a bit too affectionate. She came up to me, and is currently sitting on my arms as a type this message, rubbing her face into my face. Okay. This is scary because now, my face is itching like HECK! and two, I'm afraid that she has some sort of mite or something, because she always scratches herself, over the norm (we've had tons of cats in our past, trust me, it's more than normal). So, after a minute of cuddling with me, my eyes automatically puffed up... my nose is running. And i've sneeze quite a bit over the necessary. She has never done this before, but she licked my nose.. Yes... my nose... I mean seriously, come on now, you know that you make me sick... literally.... :X

So, what is a person to do, to say, feline to feline??? Should I take the 'GET AWAY FROM ME YOU ALLERGY INDUCING MONSTER!!!' or should I 'cuddle her with love and affection' that she is so desperately seeking out. I don't know. I just can't not love her. She started playing with my headphones, sniffing my laptop, sniffing me, sniffing my coffee, licked my cellphone, rubbed her face on my water bottle, took a nap on my bed, sat on my chair.... Soon enough she'll be eating out of my plate.... But I think she recognizes who takes care of her... since I vacuum the house, clean her litter, fill up her water bowl, fill up her food dish, show her some patient love and affection, play with her, and let her follow me around the house. Right now, she's sitting on the kitchen table grooming herself.... The kitchen table that I wiped down like 10 minutes ago.... the same kitchen table that will need a repeated scrubbing since the cat walked all over it...


(This is the closest picture I could find on google that represented Dora well... I am currently cameraless)

Come on now, what's the big deal? Cat's are clean??? No big deal... Except our cat apparently likes to sit in the sink.... I've also caught her in the toilet bowl twice.... I reported once and withheld the information the second time. But, I can't help myself... I love the weird little thing. Maybe she's the perfect addition to my overly eccentric family. How could we manage to get a normal cat, when everyone is so unique in my family already...?

Anyway, this was my random long awaited post...

If you are bored and lonely... maybe you can become a cat woman, like me... Okay well it's not really my cat, but my brother's, but still.... Share a little affection with someone, whether it's a sibling, a parent, a loved one, or a pet... Share that affection at least once a day, and you're mood will always be YAYish. :D

ACHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
BYE!

coming to realize

I don't know about you guys, but sometimes I feel like my posts are all 'epiphany' or 'coming to realize' posts. As though, there must be an elaborate moment of truth that emerges from the text or the experience. I dunno.

Anyway, I'm coming to realize that life is nothing without the relationships that are found within it. Life is not worth living, if not for the people life is shared with. I am not talking about spouse or a family member per se, but human interaction at large. I feel like we're on the verge of a societal decline, because people have relegated relationships to the internet. Relationships of the here and now are deteriorating at a fast pace, because people are so focused on past relationships and future networking. You need to realize that the past is the past, and the future is the future, but the here and now only comes once in a life time. People from your past are important, but if you spread yourself so thin, you'll have no meaningful relationships in your present. That's what online networking does. It spreads you thin. You tell everyone, regardless of how shallow the relationship is, about your life, and your 'deeper' friends get the same information. I don't really know how to explain it, but I feel like relationships have become destroyed. Because someone can figure out what you've been up to through networks like facebook, they never have to call you or contact you directly. We are forced to live in a virtual world, and forget that there is a greater reality.







People can spend hours on facebook, but when it comes to spending one hour with a friend they have no time. You will never get those virtual hours back. Nor will you ever be able to develop true relationships through the internet. You need physical, face-to-face contact. You need to speak, hear, smell, touch and see. If long distance relationships are difficult to maintain, well how do you expect virtual relationships to be. Why do people love TV? Because the characters are DOING SOMETHING! They are moving, seeing, feeling, smelling, tasting, LIVING! So, screw the television, screw the internet. Just take time on a daily basis and call someone, meet up with someone, do something that is unrelated to school or work. Develop some sort of human contact or interaction. The world is no place to live in, if people are not living it. The best moments of my life are those when my friends and I do something completely out of the ordinary, like walk around our apartment building for 15 minutes at 1 am, just because we can. Or playing pingpong with my dad, just because we have 10 minutes to spare. SOMETHING!

So, why am I blogging about something, when I could be doing something? Am I being hypocritical? Not really, no. Because I don't really live in a virtual reality. Everything needs some time, and I probably spend a total of an hour at most, daily, on the internet. The last time I blogged was about 2-3 weeks ago. I share my experiences with people who I may not physically see or hear, essentially come into contact with, but experiences are there to be shared. But you need to realize that every tool is just a means. I find blogging an effective way of communicating my experiences. But if I live to blog, then that's a problem. Hence, the fact that I'm not a daily blogger. :x

Anyway, so my message is this. L.I.V.E. Living entails human interaction, and not at a virtual level. Move, experience, test, smell, aspire, change, forget, remember... DO SOMETHING! Get off your computer and just talk to your dad/mom/sibling/friend/acquaintance for like 5 minutes. Just 5 minutes! Recognize that human interaction is the foundation of society, and without it, we'll fall apart.

peace
-reem

learnable moments.

Quote of the day:
From the 'Anarchist Against the Wall' presentation at WSU today from 12:15-1:15pm.

"Congratulations LGBT community.. you have now the ability to be masculine and kill people." (Gal Lugasi; Anarchists Against the Wall), on the DADT. This is an anti-war activist, anti-occupation activist. It had nothing to do with LGBT rights, but about warfare.

Well I guess you learn something everyday.









So, I am discovering, through my oral history class, that everything someone says can be filled with so many things to learn. Meaning, even if it sounds stupid as hell, you will experience a 'teachable moment' (or maybe a 'learnable moment'); you just need to be RECEPTIVE and OPEN to it.

This is teaching me so much about myself. I am discovering that I talk a lot less than I used to. I have become an observer. Where everything someone says must be filled with something to take from it. It doesn't matter who they are, what they represent, or whether or not you agree with them. Regardless, there is something that you will learn. It has turned into a game with me, I must discover something that I learned before the conversation (or the day!) ends!

So, as a teacher/instructor, we talk about 'teachable moments', but we forget that we need to be receptive to those moments. We have to recognize that everyone has something, some sort of impact and influence. This influence shapes you (and them) internally and externally, whether it's at a shallow level or a deep level. Recognizing this makes you unravel personal biases, and accept everyone without a standard that you may unintentionally set for them. The only standard set is the recognition that they have some sort of reciprocal influence on you, and therefore they are valuable. This value is never to be discounted, because, whether or not you discover the 'learnable moment', you recognize the person as someone who is worthy as an individual.

Dubois says that the factors that make a life worthy are the ability: to move, to know, to love, to aspire. (The Dubois Reader, Representative Men, John Brown, pg 259)

I agree with Dubois on that one. And I feel like, one mechanism towards achieving that worthy life is through recognition of other beings who are capable of doing those things. To not live in your own self-created bubble of a biased world. To move, to know, to love, and to aspire.

I guess I'll stop here...

peace
-reem

Chivalry is dead?

PEACE!!!!!!!

Okay, so they say 'chivalry is dead'. That men, the carriers and inheritors of this chivalry, lost it at some point in time. I am not sure if I agree, or if chivalry is limited to manhood... but anyway...






This morning, I opened the door for a couple of people behind me. After 2-3 people passed through, one man... REFUSED to let me hold the door open for him. He absolutelyrefused. I was trying to figure out what he meant by it...
So, my hypotheses are:
1) He was so chauvinistic that a woman could not open the door for him
2) He was so embarrassed that he had not opened it for me.
3) That it was wrong for his individualism to have someone (regardless of gender) do something like opening a door for him.
4) Women are not supposed to be openning doors, because of cultural norms.
5) He was ashamed of not thinking of opening it first.
6) He just felt like, because I opened it for people, someone should have reciprocated and opened it for me.
7) He was having a bad day and just woke up on the wrong side of the bed.
8) I challenged his independence
9) He wanted to remind me of my dependence
10) Muslim women should not be interacting with men (okay this one is a STRETCH!)

Okay... well those are my different theories. You can thow in a couple of your own! I just don't get why he wouldn't just let me hold the door open.

But on another note. The other day, there was this guy in a wheelchair. And he had pressed the button for the door to open, but I just felt like it was so unaccomodatingly slow, so I just held it open for him. We started talking after. He told me that he really appreciated that I held open the door, because often people just assume that 'we don't want to be seen in an inferior light, and so people don't do the courteous things, like holding open the door' It made me realize, that being courteous had nothing to do with independence or dependency. It had to do with the fact that you generally respect and love people. He kept on thanking me, and encouraged me to continue to be courteous, because now-a-day, there are few nice people left.

So, the question is.... Is chivalry dead? Is it limited to men (i.e. knights in the medieval periods)?

Much love,
reem

smile effect

What have we come to???????!

I'm a smiley person, I just walk around with a grin on my face. But lately, people have been coming up to me and asking me the reasons behind the smile. Like I am committing something wrong, or not acting normal, by smiling.

Some of the statements/reactions I've gotten are:
"you look like you're harboring a secret"
"mischievous smile"
"you look like you're planning something"
"you shouldn't be so happy"
"you're always smiling, and it always confuses me"
"one day that smile is going to disappear"
"f*ck you, you're not happy"
"get over yourself"
*returns grin with a shake of the head*
*avoids eye contact*
*cocks an eyebrow up questioningly*
*scoffs*

I don't know why smiling has become such a "wrong" in today's society. I sometimes unintentionally smile. Or I just like sharing the happiness. There are times when I need to convince myself to smile, just to keep a cool. I smile out of relief. Out of private conversations I have in my head. Through the recollection of memories. At another smiling face. To follow the advice of the prophet of Islam, in that "a smile in the face of your brother/sister is a charity". To release discontent. To mock myself. To love myself. To discover my inner thoughts. To brighten someone's day. To brighten my own day. To stay 'together'. To keep things positive. To follow my heart. To change my heart. To love myself. To destroy personal biases. To unconditionally love.

Anyway, these are just a few examples of why I may smile. So, if you see me on campus with a giant smile on my face, it isn't out of some 'sketchy' purpose. It is out of all of the above, or despite them all.

Just a quote from Shakespeare's Othello "The robbed that smiles, steals something from the thief." The 'thing' that is reclaimed through my smile, is my unconditional love for people.
<3 *GRIN* <3

No one is perfect.

Take in a deep breath... hold it for about ten seconds... let it go... Repeat 15 times.

I am attempting to remain calm. I am attempting to keep myself together. I am attempting to stifle my 'reactionary' anger.

I was with my sister and she told me "No one is perfect, nor do you have to be" (I don't think she said it that way, but that's what I understood)... after she said that... I just wanted to curl up in a ball, somewhere, and hide.

My dad (who I love beyond reason, but in this instance I was ready to flip out on) walked in... took a look at me... and basically, told me to leave and find somewhere to calm down. To do whatever it took, for me to relax. I don't think he realized how he said it to me, because in my (twisted and somewhat irrational at that moment) head, it came off as accusatory... Like, you have no right to be frustrated and expressing that frustration right now. I know he did not mean it in that way, but that's how I perceived it. So, I told him to calm down. I projected onto him. I was on the brink of flipping out.

I need some excedrin, because I have this pounding headache, that won't go away. I don't think my parents realize how stressed out I am. I try to keep things positive. I try my hardest to refrain from complaining. I try my hardest to imagine what it may have been like for them in college/grad school or anything. I pretend to be them, and wonder how they may have acted.

I am jealous. I am jealous of my sister and my brother. Sometimes, I'm jealous of my mom and dad too. But specifically, my siblings, because they are so good at letting things go. They are so good at just embracing what is, and going with the flow. One word from my sister, and I feel like my heart is pumping, my lungs are unconstricting, and the flow of oxygen makes it to my brain. She is my reminder to "breathe".

I always wish I had more patience, but in this instance, I wish I could be patient. There's a difference between having and being. But, there's a thin line for me. A thin line between euphoric elation and extreme anger. One psychological word play... and that's it.

I scare myself.

I think, though, I need to remember...
"No one is perfect, nor do you have to be"...
Repeat it like a mantra...
Take in a deep breath...
hold it for about ten seconds...
let it go...
Repeat 15 times.
"No one is perfect, nor do I have to be"...