The simple moments that can only be described as mercy

Oh, my middle child, my mini-me, my distracted, careless, clumsy, caring, creative son. I really believe that God duplicated my brain to give to that kid, well, except for my eating preferences, which He gave to my littlest, and my sarcasm, which He gave to my eldest.

So, he says to me “mommy, for your birthday I want to give you a necklace, can you buy that so I can give it to you?” And I smiled, because he believes with all his little heart that a necklace is the one thing that I really really would love. I bought it for him, and they wrapped it, and tied it with a ribbon, and he was very pleased that he’ll be giving it to me for my birthday.

The amazing thing about kids is how humbling it is when they show their love and appreciation, it’s just so genuine and uncomplicated. We should all take a lesson from kids – keep it real!

Life, death, kids, iron-man

Radio: bla bla bla bla Iron Man 2 bla bla bla

Previously very quiet, kids #1, 2, 3 (in unison): When is Iron Man 2 coming out? When? When mommy?

Me: Well, I don’t know guys, they weren’t talking about the movie, they just said the name.

4 year old: What? Why? But when is it coming out then?

Me: Amm, like I said… I have no idea.

3 year old: Well, when is Spiderman 3 coming out?

I think I was close to a breakdown yesterday morning. Very close. There was a 2 inch think hard layer of ice and snow on my car, I was late for a meeting, I was late for taking one kid to school, the second one had diarrhea, the third had a flu and was a constant crying mess, the van doors were all frozen shut, the ice scraper was in the garage (because, hi – it’s April, altho, yes, I am aware I do live in Canada), and the garage door was also frozen shut. I became a sobbing mess in my car, out of breath and with frozen hands, while my kids watched me quietly. The good news though is that I recover very quickly, and usually am able to retain perspective.

Today I cried for little Maddie, who I don’t even know, but it’s amazing how the loss of this precious soul could bring together so many people, and help us all to be really grateful for what we do have.

You may want to call me morbid, but I do think about death a lot. I feel like I need to have a plan, just in case something happens. But mostly I feel like, I don’t want to have any regrets, I don’t want to feel like I didn’t say “I love you” enough, or hugged enough, or that I was angry to much for no reason, or that I should have showed my love more.

I often think life is to short for crap, and honestly I think it helps me keep focus on the important things – most of the time anyways. So, love a little more, argue a little less, and tonight hug your kids a little tighter.

Love Thursday & things that made me weep

Or, on love and pain…

Often I find myself wondering why love is so powerful. How it manages to make us feel every possible emotion all at once. But mostly how empty we feel without it.

Some days I wake up with headaches so bad that I wonder if I even slept at all. Most of those days I lay in bed pondering the point of my life, but I almost always find something waiting for me that confirms what I already know is true, that there is a larger purpose to life, that my hardship is a test, and that love, no matter how painful, seems to be worth it.

Yesterday morning, I woke up to a very unexpected email. I’ll share some of it with you…

I also wanted to say that your post today about being kind to people – I loved it. I realized that my empathy/sympathy/kindness/compassion levels are at its most acute when I feel pain myself; I guess then I project the kindness I wish I was receiving… or something like that…

I also wanted to say – even though we’re not in contact, or friends, or even email buddies. I love your blog, I make duah for you, and my mom, who is on hajj at the moment, has a list of names for duahs I requested her to make on my behalf (I don’t even know if that’s permissible; well, the duas will come from her anyway, so that’s also okay!), and know that your name is being called out in the holy city. Just because…

And I cried. Because somehow someone who doesn’t even know me is praying for me while on hajj.

I thanked her for her duas, and then she floored me with her beautiful words. I got her permission to share them with you…

Now you’ve gone and made me cry

Kheir, dear. If we can recognize our tests for what they are, that in itself is a blessing. I pray you derive the wisdom, strength, beauty and growth from your experience, and your new journey. Inshallah.

Yeah, life is complicated. Each and everyone of us are complicated. It’s there just beneath the veneer of ‘normality’ – our true roughed up selves.
(There’s that Jack Nicholson movie called ‘As Good As It Gets’ where one character says she just wants ‘normal’, and her eavesdropping mother in all her wisdom interrupts her by shouting “It doesn’t exist!”)

It takes courage to be honest/truthful with ourselves, to stop ignoring our true voices, to live our lives with integrity. Alhamdulillah that He has given you the chance to do that. But you know this.

And He knows, and we do not.

And there’s beauty in our pain, isn’t there? The way it can soften/toughen us in turns, the way it makes us seek Him, the way it makes us feel like a child again for His love, affection, pleasure, approval, the way it makes us depend on Him… The way it can open our eyes to the Truth.

Surely only love can make us want to prayer for people that we’ve never met, only love can make us want justice for strangers suffering unfairly, only love can make us see beauty in things that on the surface look completely disastrous.

Happy Love Thursday

On support and mercy

It’s been an amazingly difficult year for me – by far the most difficult of my entire life. Now, I’m astounded by the support that comes from places that you would least expect, at the time that you need it the most. I would go so far as to call it a miracle even, this support that I’ve found in people who continue to awe me everyday with their strength and faith and friendship.

I got the best compliment of my life recently, and no, it wasn’t “wow, you look particularly hot today”, although someone did tell me that today – that may be a miracle all on it’s own actually! I can’t share the compliment because it was so good that I was humbled and brought to tears because of it, because of the person that said it, because no one ever told me something that made me feel so blessed and unworthy all at the same time. And funnily enough, she is a person I’ve always thought of as a gift to the world, or the blogisphere at least!

In the spirit of feeling good, what’s the best compliment that you’ve ever received?

A story for love thursday

As you are reading this, I am on my way to Blogher… and no doubt feeling pretty nervous, but very excited.

While I’m away, I thought I would share with you a story about my dad, as it’s Love Thursday and everything.

Since I was about 10 I’ve lived away from my dad, and although I have always felt his presence in my life, I always miss him, and now when I see dads with their daughters it makes me smile – I think that it’s a relationship that is special to me because it allows me to reminisce about the times with my dad.

Anyway, when I was a little girl, I think we were asked to build a circuit or something like that, and I had no idea what to do so I told my dad and he said that he would help me. My dad is a bit of a perfectionist – something I only realized in adulthood – so after about 2 hours I got really bored and left his side… The next morning when I got up, I was completely astonished to find that my dad had built an entire house with working lights!!

Now, as much as I was impressed with his dedication to my simple circuit, there was no possible way that I was toting that thing to school! I envisioned walking into my class with this huge house and decided that the embarrassment would be way to much to handle. And so, sadly, I left the house that my dad spent an entire night working on for me. Yes, I regret it to this day, but it made an excellent doll house, and all my cousins were really jealous of it!