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Can you guess who
is this " Stranger " in Our Homes ?
"A few months before I was born, my dad met a stranger who was
new to our small Tennessee town. From the beginning, Dad was
fascinated with this enchanting newcomer, and soon invited him
to live with our family. The stranger was quickly accepted and
was around to welcome me into the world a few months later.
As I grew up I never questioned his place in our family. In my
young mind, each member had a special niche. My brother, Yusuf,
five years my senior,was my example. Samya, my younger sister,
gave me an opportunity to play 'big brother' and develop the
art of teasing.
My parents were complementary instructors-- Mom taught me to
love Allah, and Dad taught me to how to obey Him. But the
stranger was our storyteller. He could weave the most
fascinating tales. Adventures, mysteries and comedies were
daily conversations. He could hold our whole family spell-bound
for hours each evening. If I wanted to know about politics,
history, or science, he knew it.
He knew about the past and seemed to understood the present.
The pictures he could draw were so life like that I would often
laugh or cry as I watched. He was like a friend to the whole
family. He took Dad, Yusuf and me to our first major league
baseball game. He was always encouraging us to see the movies
and he even made arrangements to introduce us to several famous
people.
The stranger was an incessant talker. Dad didn' t seem to
mind-but sometimes Mom would quietly get up-- while the rest of
us were enthralled with one of his stories of faraway places--
go to her room, read the Qur'aan.
I wonder now if she ever prayed that the stranger would leave.
You see, my dad ruled our household with certain moral
convictions. But this stranger never felt obligation to honor
them. Profanity, for example, was not allowed in our house--
not from us, from our friends, or adults. Our longtime
visitor,however, used occasional four letter words that burned
my ears and made Dad squirm.. To my knowledge the stranger was
never confronted. My dad was a teatotaler who didn't permit
alcohol in his home - not even for cooking.
But the stranger felt like we needed exposure and enlightened
us to other ways of life. He offered us beer and other
alcoholic beverages often.
He made cigarettes look tasty, cigars manly, and pipes
distinguished. He talked freely (probably too much too freely)
about sex. His comments were sometimes blatant, sometimes
suggestive, and generally embarrassing.
I know now that my early concepts of the man-woman relationship
were influenced by the stranger.
As I look back, I believe it was Allah's Mercy that the
stranger did not influence us more. Time after time he opposed
the values of my parents. Yet he was seldom rebuked and never
asked to leave. More than thirty years have passed since the
stranger moved in with the young family on Morningside Drive.
He is not nearly so intriguing to my Dad as he was in those
early years. But if I were to walk into my parents' den today,
you would still see him sitting over in a corner, waiting for
someone to listen to him talk and watch him draw his pictures.
.................. His name you ask?
We called him TV
... !
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