Safa means tranquil, serene, calm…I try

from continually running around on this hamster wheel but expecting a different outcome. My son will is 21 months old so I think I should let him off the hook for my excess weight. What’s so frustrating is that I could probably write a book on weight loss! I know basically to eat less and move more. However, I am NOT doing it.

Over the years, I’ve been on Jen.ny Craig, LA Weigh.t Loss, Cur.ves, and most recently We.ight Watchers. I am not into fad dieting as I know they don’t work. I could easily say the probem is that I just like food. However, I know I can still like food and eat the types of food I like without ballooning out of control…but I don’t.

Ugghhh, this is so frustrating. I think I have reverse body dismorphia or something. I’ve been looking in the mirror and seeing a “voluptuous” beauty for the past year. Reality is that I am really overweight and need to “STOP THE INSANITY”….as the ’90s weight loss guru Susan P.owter used to say.

True story: My friend was over my house last year. She and I are the same age almost to the day. My son, then 5, was amazed that we were the same age. Here’s how it went:

Son: Y’all are really both 34?
Me: yes, we will both be 35 next month in February
Son: For real Miss C?
Friend: Yup
Son: OK, but actually my mom is probably older because she’s fat right?

I started crying in my heart. I remember telling my husband while I was pregnant this same child in 2002 that I didn’t want to be the mom at my son’s school that the kids said was fat. Don’t you guys remember “that” mom who came to the class and y’all laughed because Johnny’s mom was a pig? Well, I never wanted to be that mom for my children.

I’m almost to the point where I WILL start ripping out tags in my clothes so hubby won’t see what size I’m in. I always thought that once I out grew a size 12, I would just die!!!! God those were the days.

There’s a new girl who started at my job last week. She is very nice and friendly. She’s a little too happy and talkative though IMO. I think most of the co-workers are a little uncomfortable with the ease in which she has insinuated herself to the job. She’s very hyper and “girlfriend-ee” if that makes sense? She is NOT understated in her dress or manner. For example, everyone takes turns providing breakfast for our weekly staff meetings. This will usually include bagels, juice, fruit or something like that. This lady volunteered to do breakfast her 1st week here…which is fine. However, why did she start setting up an hour before the meeting???? She had boiled eggs, bacon, waffles, (brought her own toaster from home) etc….people were looking at each other like, “this is not IHOP”.

Anyway, she will be shadowing me one day this week so as we were discussing the logistics of the day, she told me to call her a nickname that she says everyone calls her. Now, she has a long name so I assumed her nickname would be a variation of her name…like beth instead of elizabeth or neesha instead of shaquaneesha. However, ol’ girl told me to call her ‘dimples’. I gave a little nervous giggle and asked “huh”? She was like, “oh no, everyone calls me dimples, my mom, aunties, teachers, etc since my name is so complicated”.

A few things popped into my head while she was chatting away 1) We are two of three “sistahs” in our division and the third is our boss….I doubt the others will be calling you dimples 2) This is a professional setting AND your 7th day here…a little familiar aren’t we? 3) There ain’t a dayum dimple no where on your face!!!

I’m sorry, I don’t feel right calling a co-worker (albeit one who’s sweet as pie) dimples as I walk the halls at my job!!!

The following is a pic of actual shopping list I found in the produce section of the supermarket the other day. Do you think they are from the south???????

List Highlights:

margin
pigs feets
scrapples
honee
fatsbacks
white taters
cakemixs
sweettaters
mayters
strawburrys
peenut budder
letus
clorocks
linedry soap
orange drank
hinee paper
cukes

For those of you who don’t know - and if you don’t have young children or relatives, you may not, Diego is the cousin of Dora the Ex.plorer. My son loves Diego. Last Sunday I took him to see Diego Live. There were a few things that I wanted to mention about that excursion. These live shows for children are very relaxed and audience participation is encouraged. Children are encouraged to sing along, jump up and down and also do a call-refrain with the cast when warranted. My son can be somewhat reserved. If we had been sitting in the front rows, he probably would have been very active. We had great seats in the lower balcony level. We were right center, front and a little raised from the stage. Anyway, he would always look around at the other kids before he would get up and dance or whatever. Here’s what disturbed me as I sat there watching other families: if your child does not want to participate, this is not a reason to chastise! I saw mothers getting angry at their little ones because they didn’t want to jump up and down hootin’ and hollerin’. Dude, you purchased the ticket for them to see the show. Chill out. I felt so bad for those kids. On the other hand, it was pretty annoying watching parents more into the show than their children. For real, when Diego asks “you” to jump up and say “Rescue Pack” or “roar like baby jaguar”…they are really speaking to YOUR CHILDREN! It was so embarrasing. The other thing…

Do not buy tickets in the nose-bleed section if you plan on bringing your big aunt Essie. There were at least 3 families who really made me cringe. When the usher would point in the direction UP the stairs where they were to sit, people got attitudes! One lady almost cussed out her relative and loudy said, “all these damn stairs!”. It was very painful watching certain people take 15 minutes to walk up a flight of stairs! Some were leaning so heavily on the thin bannister I thought it would break.

Oh, and I felt like I could guess which families got their taxes back by the amount of crap they purchased. Now don’t get me wrong - I definitely bought my son a tee-shirt and one of those annoying light things where you push a button and Diego would spin around inside the bulb…aside…I paid $15 for it and my toddler threw it across the room in anger when J tried to take it back. We were in the house 3 minutes and it broke! Anyway, there were people who purchased waaaaayyy too much stuff, including candy, soda, etc. I mean really. I was digging those prepared families who packed granola bars and juice boxes:)

Finally, on t.v. Diego is about 8. Now I understand that it may be difficult to get an 8 year-old performer. However, should the stage version of Diego look 35???? Dora even made an appearance and she looked about 35! My son was not feeling that LOL!.

My dilemma….the Backyardigans will be there in June…I like them….I may have to leave my son home and put on my dancing shoes!

This past Saturday at my son’s school was the annual Quran Rectitation Competition. He is kindergarten and he schools goes up to 7th grade. In Islam, it is a goal to not only read verses of our Book but to memorize as much of it as possible. There are a fortunate group of individuals who have actually memorized the entire Quran. They are “hafiz” of Quran. It is such a blessing to be able to do this. There are children who have memorized the Quran. My whole family went and although my son didn’t advance to this final, open competition, he wanted to go to support his peers. My husband and I initially saw this an a way to motivate our son to get more serious about his studies. However, we left inspired and motivated ourselves. It is something to see a 6 year old recite many verses so beautifully! All of the 25 finalists know more Quran than me. These are regular children from various backgrounds. The beautiful thing about it is that they are not force to do this. They play and act as any child would at their age. However, when it comes to this part of their lives, they are serious. I sat there looking at some of them before the competition started. They were all huddled on the floor practicing and helping one another. It was enough to bring tears to the eye.

After this, I really have no regrets that we got rid of the t.v. My son watches his little movies on the DVD player and watches certain shows when he visits people but we always have time set aside for religious studies. Many families have television and are able to balance. WE ARE NOT ONE OF THOSE FAMILIES. We lacked discipline and were always battling and neglecting other things in order to watch our shows. If we had been more disciplined, we probably would have kept the television. For certain shows….there is you.tube. For me, I have caught up with scenes of the return of Jesse and Angie (see below).

Anyway, during these times when I get depressed and find myself lacking and my iman (faith) fluctuating, it really is an iman booster to see these young people so dedicated and disciplined. Just thought I’d share. Oh, yesterday (Sunday) I took my son to see Die.go Live in the Great Jag.uar Rescue. My next post MUST be about this interesting outing!

They are back!!!!!!! I read this on the web somewhere and looked at the show’s site to get all the info. OK, even though I no longer watch the show, I will be following this story line. Let me just say that the title of this post was originally “Jessie Hubbard” but I couldn’t find a solo pic of him from back in the day LOL! They were America’s 1st black soap opera supercouple….

Please indulge my pre-muslim reminiscing………

Without a doubt, Jessie was my first love…call it puppy love, whatever. All I know is that when he “died” in 1986, I was 14 and cried my eyes out for weeks…no seriously. Then about a month after his “death”, he and Angie (Debbie Morgan) hosted an episode of New York Hot Tracks (remember this show DJ Diva?) a music video show in the ’80s and I taped it just so I could see him and almost convince myself that he hadn’t actually died.

My crush on Jessie (Darnell Williams) started when I was a wee lad of 11 (circa 19 and 83). He was a teen hooligan who caused much mayhem in Pine Valley. Angie was the daughter of Les and Pat Baxter…a child of priviledge. They got off to a rocky start but fell in love. You know the rest…everyone was against it from the start, he turned his life around and became a pillar of community, they married, had a baby and then he was killed in the line of duty.

20 years later, they’re back. Apparently he had to fake his death for the family’s safety. Angie, a doctor, moved along the soap opera circuit as ‘Angie the widow and single mom’ for several years. I tried to watch her but (don’t laugh) it was too painful because it brought back too many memories of my beloved Jessie. Over the last 20 years, I’ve even thought of Jessie and brooded about how messed up it was that he was killed. I often wondered what might have been. This is how crazy I am - when I went to All My Chi.ldren’s webpage and read through the couple’s retrospective, I cried! It brought it all back…the memories and storylines. Then I started crying as I remembered Greg and Jenny…Jessie and Angie’s best friends who also had a beautiful love story.

Please continue to read my blog…I’m only mid-line crazy! O.prah would say, “it really isn’t about Jessie and Angie find out what you’re really crying about”.

I know, these characters make me remember more innocent times. I mean, my biggest problems during those years were really about Jessie and Angie and other lame things…I know how lame right?

If you were presented with the following scenario, what whould you do?:

Your hubsand is looking for a better job. He’s unhappy at his current job and feels he has hit the ceiling. You hear of ajob opportunity that would be perfect for him. The only problem, it’s at the company you currently work for. You guys would not be working together - or even in the same department. However, it is your company and you would see him. There are some advantages of course - like saving on gas by carpooling, an extra $300 to you for referring him to the company, ….well maybe these are the only advantages.

Although this isn’t necessarily my situation, I thought about it when a friend asked my advice. Personally, I love my “me” time. As a mother of 2 young children, the only time I get to myself is in my car driving to and from work. Also, I enjoy sharing my days events with my husband. Plus, I am private and don’t really like merging all parts of my life. This may sound selfish but growing up the oldest of 4 girls, I am UBER senstive about having “my” stuff. When I got married, I had to get over that real fast. Now that I have a husband AND children, I hardly have anything that is really mine. My work and my little side hustle (southern living at home consultant) allow me to have something all my own. Plus, my husband and I would clash in the car b/c we listen to different talk radio programs. I remember reading a post by DJ Diva that she and her husband carpools and they love it. I remember thinking that was so cool but I would get tired of it after a few months.

But, in Islam, you should want for your brother/sister what you want for yourself. So, in that vein, wouldn’t it almost be incumbant upon you to allow your husband to work in a company that would make him happy, give him more money and therefore probably be a benefit in your marriage? I really had to think hard about this question. Honestly, I don’t think I could do it. What about you?