Friday love to brilliant writer, novelist, social commentator, and recent MacArthur “genius” grant recipient, Junot Díaz! Hurrah for men who help open up the space for other men to speak more honestly and directly about the issues of intimacy that profoundly impact all of our lives. “There is a built in cultural aporia, a stigmatism in the way that men view and imagine women. It’s generalized, most of us are not aware of how we have acquired a vision of... Read more
The note hanging above my desk reads: “Love is the answer.” I look at it every time I get overwhelmed with work, or sucked into Facebook. It helps me to remember why I am on this earth, what drives me and what sustains me. It’s become my mantra. And yet things weren’t always this way. Five years ago it felt like love was killing me. Love was not the answer; it was the problem. That’s before I found out that... Read more
Our wonderful contributor Huda Al-Marashi pens this hilarious piece for The Rumpus in which she considers what life would look like if she was/did/believed all the things she thought she should. I met my husband while on location at a photo shoot for a perfume ad. I was the scantily-clad siren posing in the waves, and he was the beefy guy with his hands on my waist, his face buried into curve of my neck. In between takes, we... Read more
Our love to the fabulous, powerful, and beautiful Balpreet Kaur, a Sikh-American woman who responded to ignorance with confidence, compassion and love. After finding her picture posted in Reddit’s “Funny” section under the title, “I’m not sure what to conclude from this,” Balpreet responded: Hey, guys. This is Balpreet Kaur, the girl from the picture. I actually didn’t know about this until one of my friends told on facebook. If the OP wanted a picture, they could have just asked and I... Read more
Unlike the movies, making a life with another person is rarely a happily ever after. There are stormy seasons and safe comforting shores by turn. In our life together, there have been times that my husband Yusuf and I could have given up because those comforting shores were nowhere to be seen. But, this week marks three decades together as wife and husband. In making it this far together, I’ve discovered four hard-learned truths in the creative process that is... Read more
Check out more photos in Buzzfeed’s collection entitled, The 50 Most Romantic Photos of All Time. Read more
Last week we highlighted Avital Chizhik’s wonderful NYT post “The God of Marriage“, which details striking similarities between Orthodox Jewish and Muslim courtship and marriage rituals here in the US. Ms. Chizhik wrote us a lovely email soon thereafter, saying, in part: I spent a good hour reading through other posts on your site, and wanted to tell you that I love your work. It’s wonderfully empowering, refreshing too, to see women finding spaces to discuss love, relationships, sexuality vis-a-vis... Read more
Cross-posted from hijabman, who is, coincidentally, the husband of Love InshAllah writer Aida Rahim! 1. My wife regularly laughs in her sleep. About an hour after we go to bed, in the off-chance that I’m still awake, I hear MrsHM let out a joyous burst of laughter. I’ll ask her why she’s laughing even though she’s in a deep slumber and usually I’ll get an unintelligible answer– something like, “The movie and penguins.” After some further prodding her mostly-sleeping self... Read more
“You need to dress sexier,” a friend in New York says, “Show some skin, go on more dates, and feign a bit of ignorance.” “You need to be more modest, not so quick with expressing your opinions,” says my mother, “and above all, play hard to get.” “You’ve got too much intellectual energy,” says another friend in California. “It scares men off.” “You need a professional degree – law or medicine or something,” says the matchmaking aunty. “Be yourself,” they... Read more
Great article in by Nigerian author Chris Abani called, “What men aren’t telling us”: “We are not subtle creatures. You might think that when you play with your hair in our presence, we know that means you like us. We don’t know for sure. Men who do are bad men (sorry, guys!). And anything you’ve been told about playing hard to get is wrong.” Read more in O Magazine, here Read more
Love, InshAllah
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