1. Hajar School tuition

2. pay off Ot’s debt

3. start saving for an emergency fund (3 month salary)

4. savings for hajar and ebrahim separately

5. cash out the credits (done 90%)

Today is another day of office persona’s clash, and I figured it out, against my better judgment, that the best solution is …

Cc the manager in emails

Start your conversation with: the manager has requested

End your conversation with: urgently required by manager

Cut off heartache-promoting long conflict conversations by: the manager agrees to the vision handed to you

When employees are late, just send them a reminder with a cc to manager,

When employees miss important meetings, send out an MOM with absent section and cc to manager.

This is it, I figured out the magic stick.

Any other way?

I love my relatives, I really mean it, I lovvve them, I sometimes fantasize about sleepovers, I’m too old, too restricted to even think it.

So many houses to choose from, which to start….

The blue blooded house,

The sister house,

The outcast sister house?

The untouchable cousins?

The low keys?

My curiosity is over the roof… here’s to a post per each. Let’s start with the true bloods, but of course! Where else should I start?!

Blue blooded cousins

This is the measure house, the number 10 in a 10 point scale, the crème de la crème, for years I kid myself into thinking I was ‘reserved’ for one of them. Little did I know, almost all of them ended up marrying from the sister house.

This is my maternal uncle house; kids turned out well, very together, and keep up a successful dewaneya, no scandal here. The mom in the house is cousin of my mom, and she’s probably the number one woman I would work extra hard for her respect and admiration. So far I’ve been doing good.

The Dad

Passed away 10 years ago, I loved him, I loved how my mom was so attached and protective of him, and he of my mom, they were very tight together, he stood by her, and so did she, and she continued to stand by his family when he is no longer here. He raised his kids to be independent responsible adults, his main and strongest achievement was keeping his kids in a constant state of ‘bundle of sticks’, strong together, always together.

The Kids

Despite the successes, and after getting married to a relative common to both of us, I began to visit them more often, understand them more, bit by bit, the picture perfect family was not as perfect. Some marriages are just going by the flow, some of them are surviving multiple betrayals, the girls can be harsh, my cousin’s wives are not that keen to be in their houses as much as their parent’s house. But the only woman that stood it for me is…

The Mom

How can I describe her? If she earned my mom’s complete respect, she passes with flying colors! She’s not bitchy, nor talkative, kind and smart, she is careful not to hurt, and very attentive to details, unfortunately negative details as well, so I have to be careful not to disappoint her.

I see her as much as I can without appearing too sticky, if I had it my way I would go to her every morning, I especially enjoy her company when we are alone, with no one to take her attention away from me.

i’ve had this as one of my 2011 resolutions, to get two people married… its weird resolution, but its a positive outcome of my social rounds, i definitely wanted to legitimize socializing in the highest honor, and whats a higher honor than this. what i do know, and up to my knowledge, both the groom and the bride are good and kind people, come from good and kind families, the groom is a relative of my husband, the bride is a relative of mine, i know her, i know her parents, i know her grandparents from both sides. and its a funny and  painful thing to hear she got married, even if i wroked for it…

i first attempted that she marry my nephew, but they used the ‘she is completing her education excuse’, and now for some reason, she isnt using this reason, probably because this guy’s family has the same last name as hers… long story short, im happy that i rose above this particular pain. and im glad that i heard the news from mom, and that mom has paid her respects to them and congratulated them highly, as if they have never caused her pain…

cousins.. and relatives, ohhhhh… must be a long post due coming.

for now, its marriage in the air..congrats to m and m

my 2012 resolutions:

1. reach 66 kg.

2. read more qoran, and instill it in my kids

3. pay off the remaining of the credit.

4. help out nephew in marriage.

5. go on a family cruise, preferably europe-portugal route, and hopefully on the disney cruise.

6. keep paying more attention to my self physically and mentally.

7. keep the social circle rolling, especially with my family, and close relatives.

8. buy a reed krakoff (!!)

9. buy two more gold sets.

10. keep saving for hajar, and open ibrahim saving account.

i feel like i missed on some goals, so will add later.

Isn’t it scary to realize I am the first love of someone, and even scarier to know I ended up being his wife?

My habit of blogging upon random instances is unfair to the display of my reality…I miss out on so many amazing moments, like for now he has become a muathin for the nearby mosque, and I really wanted to write a complete post about it. But missed my window, and was overwhelmed by other feelings.

This is probably the first time my husband has found a peaceful place to work and commit to.

I notice the small things, and I have noticed he is building as big as possible of a fortress around me, and protect me from anything outside our apartment. As gently as I can, I whisper to him in very distant hints this is affecting our relationship. He is making me suffocate with love, taking away a lot of the time that I need to see my mother freely, my friends, my relatives, my escape by myself, or with my kids.  I cannot move anywhere without him there with me, I barely get a  chance to break free, I must even consider going to work as my only outlet, not even going to my family counts, as he goes with me every time.

I’m taking one week off from work with the intention of filling his insatiable appetite, but I’m feeling the burn of captivity so soon. I picked the longest week, and I had so much that I wanted to do if I was not waking up every morning for work.

So far he refused that I go for a wedding, or do my social round, I don’t even want to ask for a mall trip, not because he will say no, but because I’m afraid it will be counted, and he will think of it as a significant amount of time apart from each other.

Hajar and Ebrahim in Denver

Display of Hajar art work from School

Ebrahim at Grandma house

Hajar at central park manhattan

Hajar laughing to tears..

Today I walked out of a meeting (after it finished) feeling underappreciated. And I had a desire to look for a certain office that I can walk in and just say what I feel fresh out of the oven.

It wasn’t what was said in the meeting but more what wasn’t. The months following Ramadan has been rolling nonstop. Filled with exciting tasks and activities, up to the point that I not only feared the approach of the week’s end (which is normal for me) but significantly to disliking a business trip in a faraway spot. During this time, I have continued to have a multitasking approach on work, a habit without a doubt, but also even if I wanted to quit it, it is enforced on me by management approach to employee’s tasks.

But this particular month, I feel a steady flow of negative events, not one, not two, but a series…

• Gossip: to the management level, one supervisor mentioned I am gossiping negatively about him / never even worked with him to know who he is!
•  Demotivation, I can ignore every co-workers comment, but I can not a hint of dryness from my supervisor.
•  Discouragement and undermining of my work; one co-worker when I stressed on her we need to sit down so I can keep her up to speed on one project she has ignored. She yells at me that she is busy, and I tell her we all are… in which she replied: no one is as busy as I am!!
• Disregard: we have deadlines, commitments, connected chain of events, and if someone keeps missing the deadline, things are affected, but my constant strive to get them to keep the deadline is sometimes faced with disregard.

The reason that I had the urge to walk into a fresh office… just out there to whom I can speak to someone freely, and without having to explain who I am, or fear that my words will be twisted into something totally different… the reason I felt this just after the meeting was over because I felt that small hint of dryness from my supervisor, she loves me, she knows how good I am, she depends on me, but I just didn’t feel her support, didn’t feel her encouragement, we have been so busy during those three months, that I barely remember having a laugh with her, only meetings and deadlines and action items… I miss the time when I feel as soon as she leaves my office a sense of pride of me.

I love the job, I love the excitement of my job activities and tasks, I love my development, I also love to be appreciated.

I Can’t wait for the 22^nd of December to be over.

today is particulary sad, because i confirmed today one of the people that i thought was righteous and kind, turned out to be a certified hypocrite and self centered. and instead of wining about him for hours/paragraphs. i decided to go to him straight and clear my case, i did, and he greeted me with the happiest of faces and most thankful.

but i know come evaluation time; or just the sight of my back, i will get a stab.

salute for walking straight girl. we’ll see in two months time if your straight walking is giving you the credit you deserve.

Satisfaction meter: to the roof

Appreciation meter: not quite..

i tend to complain to myself how much Ot suffocates me with his love expression, his attachment to me is scary and annoying, i sometimes crave for minutes without him. and when i do get those minutes, i run immediately in search for him with the same level of insecurity that he displays to me. we are constantly afraid of losing each other! the difference here is i am afraid of losing him physically, while he is afraid i will fall out of love.

how could i ? ? ? we have fights, and disagreements, but we have tons and tons of little connected memories and tiny little creatures made of love. we have a strong background behind us that connects us, we have each other, as i cant imagine any other woman giving him the attention and love he deserves, and he can not imagine another man able to satisfy me.

we share a habit of having moments of Zen, awareness of our situation, sometimes it is good, it happens when we’re in a bliss.. but sometimes its grave and dark, when we face a silly – I don’t know how the hell it started – fight. and usually, those types of fights are the ones hurting our marriage.

I’m looking forward for the days when i am comfortably old in my marriage, 30 years from now, when we look so much alike, and be immerssed into one person.