Okay, so, like...

peace,

Contrary to what you might think, this is not a negative post.

No, my friends, this is a very positive post.

A pink, girly, giggly post.

See... I was at an MSA Eid ulAdha event (don't start, it was excellent and the only chance I have to socialize with young Muslims), doing me, and I met these new people.

(Okay so picture the obligatorily tall broad brown dark guy, one of a group of similarly young brown guys, spouting 'alhamdulIllahs' after prayer here, and my head sticking out of the crowd of sparkly, squealing girls throwing out 'mashaAllahs'.)

There was one who caught my eye when he was reciting Qur'an before the event, mashaAllah. And there was one who was truly the most beautiful reciter I have ever heard in person mashaAllah.

Mind you everyone there but the girl who invited me is younger than I am. And I'm NOT there for men, but for being around other young muslims. So I said my obligatory astaghfirullah, right?

We all ended up at dinner after cleaning up the event mess. The beautiful reciter was there with a couple of his friends. I listened to his conversation and he was very interesting. Now I wish I had blogged it because that night was inspiring and made me realize that MSA was really good while I was in school. I miss having plain conversation with people, without it being all sexualized, just exchanging ideas, without being at work. As I remarked to my girlfriend, "Man, that was awesome. Was I that bright at 19?"

Anyway, one of the friends of the beautiful reciters had caught my eye, but again, I was feeling old and said my astaghfirUllah. Lowering the gaze and nur on faces being what they are, I was straight. I felt good about the night. I ate (twice, but 5 hrs apart so I don't feel bad), talked, and was merry with mah peoples. I felt like I'd regained a bit of the feeling, temporarily, of what I lost when I left Christianity and unknowingly my UMYF youth group culture.

And then at the end of the night, we're all leaving, and I said something about how flippin cold ("Que FRIO, CARAaaaaa!) it was in Spanish. This curly haired deep voiced guy from the group turned around.

He answered me back in perfect - and I mean spot-on-no-accent-straight-off-the-boat Spanish.

I looked at him like "whaaa--?" It must be the same look I get when people hear muhejebah morena ME going off in Spanish. We get to talking.

Turns out he speaks like 4 languages, including Urdu and Spanish. Turns out he's half Puerto Rican. Turns out he's studying at AlmaMater. All very interesting.

Now, meandirectorlady had just told me that she was looking for Spanish speakers to train (long story short, we train interpreters) from the area of MD where this particular gentleman was from. We talked so long outside the restaurant that our respective groups of friends start wandering off. I guess a conversation in a language you don't know between the tallest people in the crowd can be boring from the outside.

So I go, "hey, you want to work for me?!" that being my line of the night. I'd passed out all of my business cards to different sisters and brothers who speak languages we really need. "Yeah, un momentico...," he said, "I'm excited, you're excited, let me call you and make sure that this is something I can do."

Aiight, I thought, whatever.
He ends up calling after calling my cell and getting my voicemail, asking a bro who had got my card for the number there, calling my job, and sending me an email there.

Brotha needed a job, I'm thinking.

Then began (ahem innocent) the facebook flirtation. Which, by the way, is still up between our walls for those of you who are on my facebook and care to look. Plus he stuttered (and said, can y'all believe this, 'Wow, I'm tonguetied right now, I don't know why') and stammered his way through conducting the official bizness necessary to get him into our training when I talked to him. And I'm all, I need to chill. Astaghfirullah. All that. Y'know?

And now I'm all crushalicious. But in my professional capacity, I still have to work with him, and don't need to be flirting with him. And in my dang-I'm-25 role, I don't need to be flirting with him . And in my muslima fashion, I'm tryna front like I don't like him. And in my single role, I want to know how he treats his mom and can't believe how many people incidenally are like 'that bro is on his stuff' plus? He's a sweetie.

Please excuse my airheadedness for a second:

Okay, so, like, ohmygoodness. I, like, know this isn't gonna turn into anything, right? I mean, what is anything, anyway? But, like, what if it does? And like, am I just imagining it? Or does he like me? Ooh mylanta and he's such a chulo! And omygosh, I have got to chill out! And he's like this super-on-the-deen guy, y'know? Yeah, mashaAllah! But he's like sooooo cute! And plus I get to see him at work, but like, my boss will be there? So even if I could say something I wouldn't? But I totally want to, because, ohmygosh, he's like, funny and muslim, and he speaks Spanish and he's sooo cute! Like ohmylanta!

Had to get that out before I exploded. But that's been the bright part of a coupla horrid weeks, thank you for not puking from the valley-ness of this post.

peace
me