Birthdays and bashes

:) at the ripe old age of what I have turned today … sigh.. I will eventually get around to saying it out loud but for now I will refrain.. it leaves a lot to look to forward as against earlier expectations. When I was younger the milestones were different. When I was 5, 1st grade was a big deal. When I was in 3rd grade, 5th grade seemed really far off. When I was 12, 13 was miiiiles away. When I was in 8th grade, 10th grade girls were fully grown adults. When I was 14, 16 was supposedly the epitome of existence. And then I turned 16 and it… well I mean ok so I started inter and went to college but it wasn't really SUCH a big deal. Anyway at 16, (you got it!) 18 was the next big thing and then it came and went. In retrospect it may have been a big deal in the sense it was my first birthday with (ohmygoodness) boys in it.. much to the dismay of my dearest darlingest Abu :) who couldn't quite understand the need for that :) .. I miss him sooo much. Anyway at 18, 20 didn't seem like a big deal. In fact I think I used to forget how old I was once I passed 18 quite frequently. And I still do :) lol. Maybe I never moved beyond that 18-yr-old mindset. I'd to think that I did though. I'd like to think that I've grown. But when my 2-yr old tells me to "stop it" while waving her adorable little finger in my face, usually when I have done something not quite right in her adorable little point of view, I don't really feel very old at all. I feel small and silly. I guess each individual human mind reaches a plateau at a certain point in their lives. That's the height of your emotions & creativity. That's when your learning is accelerated and your sensitivities are heightened. That's when you feel so much that you feel you can burst and you write these long emotional dialogues to yourself that you want the whole world to read and marvel over. Its when you want the fame, the recognition, the appreciation all from external sources because somehow what's inside you just isn't enough. There's this gaping emptiness that refuses to filled, no matter how many friends you have.. no matter how long you talk on the phone.. no matter how many times you blast the music in the car and scream down the seaview boulevard. When it's all over you still come home empty craving for more. I now know that's hormones to reduce it to a biological phenomenon. Its also a deep inner impulse that drives all those who haven't been taught how to tamp down their emotions and haven't learnt the meaning of "Sacrifice" by the time they have turned 16. Because I know. I know that not all kids were like us. I knew kids who didn't have any issues not screaming away to loud blaring music… I knew kids who didn't have the avenues of entertainment & escape we were exposed to. And I knew that while they missed it, they were peaceful within themselves to an extent because they knew it was a sacrifice for a greater end.. which at 16 seems really far away. Of course we had more fun :) and more funky memories of everything that we grew up in. Memories that when savored on their own without the bindings of what followed and how the future was shaped are very dear and highly enjoyable. Especially if I read my diary :) I had a great literary sense of humor (to blow my own horn). Hats off to our parents, especially my parents, my dear darling adorable wonderful parents, who had the gumption to live through it all with us. The late night pick ups and drop offs that my Abu did, were nothing short of angelic. I love him. I miss him and inshAllah in the end I strive my hardest to have a place with him. Its scary when you think of that chemical biological evolution as being an inevitable part of life. I don't like thinking about it since I now have kids and I remember how excruciating it can be sometimes. Everything just seems more intense when it really isn't. Or maybe as we grow older the passion in us simmers down and finally dies out so we don't feel as much as we used to. Its all better now. You kill some feelings. You come to terms with others. You keep wondering about the rest. But a lot of the acceptance & belonging issues get ironed out by the time you hit 28 because for better or for worse you learn to somehow love yourself. You realize that that's all that you are and that all that you will ever have and hence you need to make the best of it. You stop feeling rejection in the true sense of the word because you have found acceptance within your self and now you know where you belong. I wish I can instill this emotion in my children from when they are 5 onwards so they never have to second guess anything about themselves. I hope my children never have to wonder if I love them; they should KNOW beyond the shadow of a doubt that I do just the way I knew. I hope I can raise them with even stronger values then my own. I hope I can teach them everything my mother and father taught me about honesty & family, right & wrong and I hope that when I guide them they accept my guidance by the grace of Allah. I hope they can achieve the inner calm, constant optimism and a stubborn disregard for anything negative, the way I have, very early on so they never have to go through the bouts of indecision or confusion that we all do. I pray that Allah is kind to them and to us and that we all end up in a truly happy place once our sojourn in this world ends. Ameen. ******************************************************************************************** Fariha's Thoughts of the Day: GoogleName: Fariha GemWorld Blogspot: http://gemworld.blogspot.com MSN Space: http://gemworldfars.spaces.live.com/