Anxiety aftermath, The BIG 5 and Bucket List Disappointment.

I want to touch lightly on the subject of the spitting incident. The thoughts are swirling about my brain and I haven't totally made sense of everything yet. The one side effect is that my anxiety is now much higher than it was before the spitting incident. I haven't gone back to that street corner since it happened and have been avoiding the area if I can. My hijab is still dirty, in the dirty laundry pile but not forgotten. It is like having a pretty foul piece of laundry that you know you have to wash but the thought of doing so makes your tummy churn and you much rather toss it but you cannot. It is bad enough having terrible things happen to you but it is awful walking around knowing that you have the potential to experience even worse examples of hate. And that is what I am afraid of the most. I know some have expected a bigger follow up but I am chipping away at this fear. With enough time and once I digest all the emotions, factors and anxiety, I am sure I will produce something that will be more of a read and thought provoker then this little blip. I've been a little preoccupied with life but you know what they say...

“Life happens.”

In my case it happens all at once. Then I will have a “nothing is happening in my life” drought. My phone was stolen and we've been dealing with the lovely viruses that are going around, yes not one but two.

Little Miss turned the BIG 5 last Monday and we celebrated in a big way for the Little Miss. I had a theme and as much as the tutorials made it look very easy, my OCD made it nearly impossible. I gave up on most of it and stuck to the usual balloons, flower pom poms and streamers. But it was still very pretty and got Little Misses seal of approval! We received a ton of rave reviews on her decorations but her streamers got the most attention! They were so simple to make! 

I would have more pictures but yeah, my phone was stolen and they never synced with my backup storage.

I used the large tissue pack from Micheal’s for $7.99. I placed all the layers on top of each other and cut a section of the tissue paper the length of the tissue paper at a width of 3 inches. When I started cutting the lines, I kept the layers together as it made it much easier and less time consuming. Then to make it reach the table, I glued with a glue stick the end pieces together. I then alternated the colors and taped balloons up top to finish off the look. I think the tissue added a softer and fluffier look then normal color paper would of.

You can find the tutorial on how I made the light lavender and dark purple streamers behind the gift table here: Zig Zag Accordion Streamers

Overall it was great experience and I am glad we did it. 

I have always had this dream of watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in person and now that I am in New York, I thought I could mark that off my list. WRONG! It's just not going to happen. In order to get spots in the “public viewing” area, I would have to be there by 5am! That would mean I would have to leave my house to take the subway by 330am. I shudder at the fact of waking Little Miss at 3am! Little Miss would morph into Little Hell On Wheels for the rest of the day! Not to mention we have a possible Nor-Easter heading our way and neither Little Miss or I need to be out in that kind of weather. Oh and by the time the parade would reach the public viewing area it would be NOON. The subway ride home would be another hour and I would be forced to run around in the kitchen to cook Thanksgiving dinner in less then three hours! Ain't happening. You couldn't supply me with enough Starbucks to make THAT happen. Sorry Little Miss you'll just have to sit on the couch with momma eating pie and watching it on TV.

Mmmmm pie.

But depending on the weather we may go watch them blow the balloons up the day before during their Inflation Celebration if we are feeling better! That should be an interesting adventure! I am sure my inner child and my actual child will be in awe watching that!

(Maybe next year Spidey!)

To the women who spit on me today.

You may not know that I moved from a small town with roughly two thousand people to a city with millions of people. I assumed that doing so would grant me the safety to openly practice my belief system without fear of attack, bullying and hate towards my family and myself. This allowed me to wear hijab and feel secure knowing that I am finally doing what my heart tells me to do. I wore it proudly and happily. It was my beacon of my testament to my faith.

But today, that hijab became a beacon of hate for you. I do not know your background nor do I know your heart. What I do know, is that your actions were inhumane. I was simply out running errands for my soon to be five year old's birthday party this weekend. You may not of noticed her in the bright pink stroller that I was clearly pushing in front of me. Today you also made her a witness to your careless hate. What did she do to you? What did I do to you? Was I some how violating the principles that our great country was founded on? I will never have your answers to these questions. Some how the group of you thought it would be funny to pick on the Muslim in front of you. So as we waited for the crossing signal to turn you made the awful decision to take away my personal religious security.

You see hearing someone “hack a loogie” makes my stomach instantly churn, I can't handle the sound. I became acutely aware that some one behind me was hacking and spitting. I then felt the nasty warm wet sensation on the back of my leg. I assumed at first that maybe it was an accident, it was a crowded sidewalk after all. But the instant uproar of laughter sent my heart to the bottom of my stomach. Then again, I heard you spit. And again. And again. You uttered these words with your heavy Jamaican accent “God hates Muslims, all them terrorists.” And if that was not enough, you spit on me one more time. God only knows what you said after that because it was as if God sealed my own ears from your hate. To prevent you causing any more pain with your degrading actions and words.

I said nothing to you. I held my head up high and walked numbly on down to my next destination, unaware of the sounds of the traffic or of the hustle and bustle of people walking next to us. I did not want to let my child know what happened or that I was upset, so I pretended as if nothing was wrong. As I watched her eat her dinner, I poked at mine. Reeling at how disgusting and second class you made me feel. I spent the rest of that time finishing my errands, completely numb and wanting to get home. I wanted to tear off my hijab and change out of my clothes as soon as I stepped through the door. I had been violated. Every thing I took for granted, you ripped away in less then two minutes. It took me years to admit that I reverted to Islam, it took even longer to wear hijab in public. And you, you took that away in an instant. You replaced my security with fear. You took something so important away from me and you had not one clue of the damage you carelessly caused.

I do not know your religion or lack of religion, but I assume by the wrong usage of “God” in your racial slur that you follow some sort of Christianity. As a revert I am not a stranger to Christianity, in fact the Bible does not excuse any hate towards your fellow humans. There are indeed several examples in the bible.(1 John 4:20, John 13:34-35, 1 John 2:11) I wanted to clarify that my God, is also your God. Our God does not want me to hate you. So I wont. But that does not mean that your actions were acceptable behaviors. Decent humans do not do that. They do not reduce people down to nothing with their phlegm and their saliva.

So after I returned to the only remaining sanctuary I have now and removed my hijab, I saw your phlegm on the back of my hijab scarf. That did it and because of you, my daughter watched me crumble in front of her because of your actions. I was no longer the only victim of a hate crime, my daughter is now and when my husband returns home from work tonight, he too will become another victim of your hate. Out of your own ignorance, inhumanity, fear and lack of knowledge you have changed our lives. For that one random moment you interacted with me, you made a decision to do something evil. Something God would never consider permissible. But God tells me to pray and forgive you and I will. I will have the patience to rebuild my sanctuary and increase my knowledge of God and his message of peace.

I will forgive you, I will forgive you. I will after the pain you caused ebbs and the anger subsides. After I place my forehead on the ground and allow the tears to fall freely, I will forgive you. Because you do not need my anger to change your heart, you need my forgiveness. I am Sama, I am stronger then your spit and my forgiveness is stronger than your hate.

This is how I practice Islam.