Okay people. I’m terribly afraid my church hopping, for the time being is on hiatus. I’ve apparently become enamored enough with a church to abandon most of my self imposed (highly ridiculous) rules I never quite articulated, but somehow pretty much followed when going to new churches.
It’s a pretty fantastic church. : )
I slept in this morning and debated back and forth about going to Springfield to the mall. I know I don’t need anything, but man, I want to see what’s out. I want a new skirt!
So, I wait around, call a friend. Finally I decide that, hey, since I’m already dressed, I might as well go. I get there, I’m driving in the parking lot and I see a family. Father, pushing a stroller, a couple children walking near him and his wife. Who happens to be wearing a brown abaya/jilbab, lacy brown scarf and a half niqaab tied under the hijab.
It is good that I came today. I’m calling the day a Full House. I ended up seeing three niqaabis and two women in bonnets! They made me feel ridiculously ‘undercover’ in my white-with purple-pink-orange flowered kerchief. Which, by the way, was complimented by the sales lady at New York & Company. She was a very good sales lady. Creepily so.
Plus, I got three sweaters on sale and three tshirts to replace some I bought to take with me to Yemen. Yeah, they were getting holes in them. Unfortunately, I have to go back tomorrow because one of the sweaters I bought didn’t get that security tag removed. What will tomorrow bring?
Seen at Target:
Woman, with a white bonnet in a grey dress. Wearing a track-style jacket and sneakers with, what I can only assume are Target tall socks. Working with the digital photo kiosk.
Warmed my heart.
So, as we were leaving class today our teacher says “Happy Easter! [pause] if, uh… you celebrate that…”
I was almost out the door, and paused myself as he did, turned a bit and looked at him as he ‘clarified.’ I was pretty sure that was for me. Because I am obviously a muslim. I debated clarifying myself as a Christian or just walking on.
In the end I just walked on, and at Good Friday service today, I wondered if that was one of my own Peter moments. When I talk to some of my classmates in Physiology, I tend to throw words like “my church” in to the conversation when possible. Though I’m not sure that relabels me as “Christian”
I suppose I’m frustrated because most people just assume and no one bothers to ask. (of course last week I think I was thankful no one ever asked)
how is it possible to be uplifted and disheartened simultaneously? or at least swung back and forth between the two in just the one day?
Today I was at work, and I was chillin’ at the nurses station, waiting for call lights when one of our hospice nurses looks up at me and asks me if I always wear a scarf. “Yes,” I reply. Right as he’s asking why I do so, one of my residents gets on her call light, to which I bust up laughing because she had already been on her light three times in the past five minutes. I grab the other aide for moral support and went to answer it. Dogded another bullet, of sorts.
Okay, wait. That last post might not have come out the way I intended. I have struggles when it comes to headcovering. And in ways these struggles go with ‘fitting in.’ I read blogs of Christian women who cover, and nearly all of these women are married. I wonder if I will ever find a husband, and if headcovering might be putting an extra barrier between me and my future husband. I’m already pretty socially inept when it comes to men, now add a headcovering? What am I thinking? Is headcovering really that important?
There are days when I wake up and I’m having a particularly good hair day and I think “Hm. I really don’t want to cover my head.” On these days, I either end up wearing a kerchief with my hair hanging down beyond it or I do a 180 and say “Screw those people! I don’t want them seeing my hair” and cover even more that I might on a ‘normal’ day.
I guess what I’m saying is I totally don’t have everything in control. I ‘like’ headcovering but I will always have issues, with this and many many other things. The only think I can see to do is take one day at a time. Today I cover. For Today. Tomorrow will come and we’ll see what goes down then.
(This post was written almost immediately after the previous one, but I’m publishing it several hours later, as long as I can figure out how to do that)
So, after mass yesterday, I was at Walmart, and there were quite a few hispanic families there as well. Well, one of the older hispanic ladies had this lace shawl wrapped around her shoulders, and I was all internally “OH! I bet that was her mantilla at mass!” and I kinda wanted to ask, but the only words that came to me were “hal hatha ‘mantilla’ fii kanisatik?” which would have totally not been appropriate. whatev.
The other day, when it was SO COLD, I was in the break room at work, getting ready to go home. I put my hat on over my kerchief and realized that the combo would drive me bananas if I had to wear it for any amount of time at all. There was one female coworker in the room with me and I decided that i would just quickly pull the kerchief off and wear just the knit hat out.
As I was contemplating this, my coworker remarked, “I’ve never seen your hair before!” which really shocked me. I even tried to argue with her! “I mean, I’ve seen the little at the front and the mass at the back, but not really.” Even though I’ve been covering for nearly six months, I tend to assume that every one I know knew me when I was “uncovered” becuase that’s how I still see myself, I guess.
I was at work the other day when a coworker asked me about my scarf. (I have gone back to the white kerchief at work.) She had asked me the weekend I wore a hijab style as well, and I thought I had said I was Christian, but apparently I didn’t because she asked if I was Muslim. I told her that no, I wasn’t Muslim, I am Christian and a quick reason why I cover. Her response? “Okay. I was just curious. It tells me what kind of person you are.”
I suppose, headcoveirng should tell you what kind of person I am, but it doesn’t really. If I’ve learned anything from headcovering, it would be to assume less. I was a very judgmental person in Yemen. Especially of foreigners and their clothing choices. I am learning that Christian women cover for many different reasons. We might all be called by the Holy Spirit to cover, but our reasons and justifications are different.
But even then, I find that I don’t fit in. First of all, I am not married (and do not have children) I work, I intend to continue to work outside the home when I’m married and have children. I probably will not home school my children.
I have dreams of returning to the Middle East as a nurse. At the same time, I have dreams of living here, on a farm. And then there’s the crazy dream of living in the middle east, nursing and having a farm! Where exactly does a husband and family fall into this? I have no idea.
I think this has steered off my course of my original intent. How does my headcovering tell you what kind of person I am? What does an average person think of a headcovering Christian lady.
Holy Jesus Snack Cup 