When I was growing up, I played mostly with my little brother. My sisters were much older and not interesting in playing really, when I was little. When I was 8 or 9, I remember we (family) got a fussball table. And so I played fussball probably more than an average kid might (unless he had one too). Last week I went to dinner at one sister's house with some friends, and the hostess had two children. A girl, 6, and boy, 5. The TV was on most of the time and the girl would watch it fairly intently. The boy would run around some then sit and watch, then run around some more... very hyper.For one reason or another, I just thought this kid was hilarious. And so, somehow I ended up playing fussball with him on a little miniature fussball table during the prayer (I wasn't praying...). And we were nearly evenly matched... but he would take away my points if I scored too many times in a row. That wasn't "fair" apparently. Anyway, it was probably more fun for me to play fussball with him than to talk to the other sisters.
This isn't the first time that's happened... in fact, I went to a wedding last summer and spent a large portion of the "dancing" time (where the sisters were taking off scarves and dancing around to loud obnoxious music) in another room, playing fussball with a 10-yr old. He hadn't ever played before so it wasn't really a fair contest. But still--was I being anti-social, to prefer to play with a little boy instead of talking (or dancing) with women my age?
I remember one time playing Lego's with my nephew on the kitchen floor, tickle-fighting with my other nephew. I used to play with my nieces, now they're 8 and preoccupied with trying to act 16. But even then, one would play with her Barbie dolls. Sorry but I got pretty bored with that... but I could play with Lego's for hours
This doesn't bother me that much, to forego the conversations of my family or friends (which for the most part tend to be pretty shallow anyway) to even more simple talk ("Do you have a red one?") with the kids. And this is odd, because for a long time I wouldn't have described myself as someone who gets along well with kids or who even like kids. That's because as soon as they start crying... I'm gone.
At any rate, I start thinking about how I actually do like doing these things, and it makes me want some kids of my own. Scary, huh?
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5 comments:
AA- Amy,
"was I being anti-social, to prefer to play with a little boy instead of talking (or dancing) with women my age?"
I don't think so...I remember when I had recently gotten married, I would despise going to dinner parties consisting of mostly 'uncles'. Since I was part of the married group, they felt obliged to invite me - it was sooo boring. I sometimes would go and hang out with the younger teen kids...
I changed when I found a social group more to my liking (and as more of my friends got married)...that may be a bit harder for you as I don't know of many sister engineers who like to play fussball. ;-)
Good luck in finding sisters interested in talking international politics or signal processing. Keep a pack of Legos in your purse just in case. LOL!
masha'allah thats cute, I too would rather sit and play with lego or climb trees than sit around with barbies. I suppose its how you were as a child, I was more of a tomboy. Girls today are too preoccupied with wanting to be older, boys just want fun :D
Walaikum as-salaam Naeem
Glad to hear I'm not the only one who finds certain conversation boring. But it's just hard for me in general to find a group that is interested in holding sustained conversation about serious topics. Not to be especially hard on women (though perhaps I should be!), it just seems like even if I can get a good talk going, about international politics for instance, it just ends up backfiring into shallow conversation again. Rather than any meaningful discussion about actual problems and solutions, it just turns into blame and insults and then people tend to quickly try and change the conversation back to gossipy stuff. B-o-r-i-n-g.
I didn't realize until just now I think, how rare it is for women to play fussball. I might have thought that women older than me would be more interested in deeper conversation than those younger, but really I find both groups have conversations which ultimately reduce down to gossip.
And truth be told, I have not found conversations with men to take that route.
This was one great thing about my sorority, actually. The "sisters" more or less thought like I did and when we would discuss an issue it could stay on topic, and at that level, without turning into mindless chit-chat. And one of the interesting things about the girls in my sorority is that until joining, most of us had been unable to carry on these kinds of conversations with other women, and only with men.
And now, spending a lot of time talking to men is not really an option for me, being Muslim. So I guess I appreciate the venues of webforums, blogs, and most especially my highly intelligent fiance.
And while I've never carried Legos in my purse, I used to carry some sort of game (cards or something that didn't take up too much space) in my purse for a long time.
Ammena -
Thanks for reading my blog, and commenting! :-) I know when I was growing up, I spent a lot of time playing with my little brother. I was a little bit of a 'tomboy' I guess, and that could have something to do with how I act now.
surely, you are alone in this.
i agree with you fully and even now that im married, i just realized that i've never been interested in the "talks" which i've always felt very not only boring but totally useless...perhaps Allah SWT had better things planned out for me to find out what they cooked over the past week or what they've bought ...regardless, even if i felt i was the tomboy, i was very much proud of it :D however, to this day i m thankful to Allah SWT that i never grew interests in such things and kept myself occupied with others.
Sister
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