My mum’s been in this country 28 years and speaks English good. Naturally, she has an accent that I find utterly adorable, most especially when instead of ‘Thank God’, she usually comes out with ‘Thanks God!’, like he’s right in front of her and sharing her cup of tea. One morning, we were speaking with the nurse who, after a 10 minute conversation with my mother, asked/stated ”You speak English?”

WTF, lady, seriously?
My mother has been speaking in fluent English for the last ten minutes.

It occurred to me that I should respond Socratic with: “You have fashion troubles?” because although she was covered in a manner of cloth, she was wearing a Christmas sweater covered in reindeer, snowflakes, a baby Jesus and a Wal-Mart. Were I to stare at her sweater a little longer or spin it in the dryer backwards, it would tell me that I’m going to burn in hell because I am a Muslimah.

Mama is much more diplomatic and responds “Yes. Have we been speaking in a different language for the past ten minutes?” with a little laugh that queues the nurse’s own laugher alongside that of the baby Jesus’.

Speaking of unfortunate fashion choices, I was walking through the main shopping centre located downtown a few days back minding my own business. I happen to be a people watcher and as people watchers are wont to doing, I watch people on a regular basis. I do this in an effort to make grandiose generalizations about their lifestyle, political leanings and personal break-up habits. I walked past this one woman who was wearing white patent leather boots over her jeans. With this, she was also wearing a black patent leather jacket, a white scarf and a white patent leather golf cap tilted & sideways. I recognized her because the glare which came off her patent leather wear brought me to my knees in the middle of St-Laurent.

(A) If you wear caps, fedoras, baseball hats, earmuffs, earphones, and/or headbands, I entreat you to please please please never tilt it sideways. Except for perhaps J who lives here, and in whose profile picture there is a photo of a cap sideways and it actually looks surprisingly charming, there is no one on this earth who may be able to pull it off.

Hasn’t anyone told you how stupid you really look? Maybe you’re drunk? Are you? Is that why you wear your cap sideways; you think it’s actually straight?

(B) Honestly, fashion sense is like dancing. You’ve either got it, or you will never find it, let alone use it wisely. What you will do is be seduced to the point of complete idiocy. I am a masterful dancer. I know this because people stare and point in awe whenever I get busy, getting jiggy with it. They wish they were I, dancing. I also have awesome fashion sense, Alhamdulilah, and for this reason, I would never tilt to the side anything I wear on my head.

(C) And speaking of wearing things on my head, I am considering wearing Hijab…or at the very least, promising Allah that by a certain age, I will be wearing it. I have been playing with different scarves and wraps and means of putting it on and I have become relatively partial to a couple of really pretty ones (knowing full well that ‘pretty’ has nothing to do with it). We’ll see, Inshallah.

I’ve received a ton of emails about this remark. I am not going to do it any time soon, but I have been thinking about it and the greater meaning of it. I should have clarified that, although your responses have been lovely, thank you. (Ultimately: Without lying to you, the bottom line is that I am currently much much too vain to wear Hijab. And to take such a decision when “under duress” of any sort, is never a good idea.)

Speaking of alcoholics, here’s a recent conversation had:
Boy: I have vices.
Girl: Vices?
Boy: Yeah. Vices, dude.
Girl no.2: That’s coooool.
Boy: Yeeeeeeah.
Girl: Vices aren’t ‘cool’. Besides. Real men get straight to addictions without wasting anyone’s time with ‘vices’.

As an aside: Late last month when I wrote much of this entry, I was waiting for someone to finish day surgery and I wrote: I am surrounded by sick people. I don’t entirely mind, but I’m wondering if I should perhaps move to another part of the hospital, such as the parking lot, where I am less likely to catch anything.

I chose to instead stay where I was and eavesdrop on other people’s conversations in order to figure out what they were in for…right before I found myself reading the mint green booklet of rules and regulations titled Aren’t you excited you’re having surgery? WE ARE! which triggered my own personal queue to leave.