[BUMbaronos]

Salaam Aleikem!

After I converted to Islam, I was unsure about wearing the hijab for a long time. I kept making excuses for myself..."I'll be discriminated against at work", "I don't know enough about Islam yet to answer the questions that will surely come to me if I wear it", etc. But the more time dragged on and the more I saw other Muslimas wearing hijab, the more I felt increasingly
guilty and wanted to do something about it. I recalled a saying among my college sorority sisters (in my days before Islam): "Excuses are the Leaning Posts for Fools!"

After September 11, I decided it was time to STOP these excuses. I couldn't keep putting off until tomorrow what I should do today, because you never know if there will BE a tomorrow. So I started wearing it.

At first, I got some pretty strange looks and questions. In time I learned how to answer them back. "Does your husband make you wear that?" ("Do you see him here with me, with a gun to my head right now?") "What is that for?" ("It's my protection. You can't keep people from looking at you in a way you don't want them to, but you can give them NOTHING to look AT.")
Soon the inquiries gave way to rudeness: "You better take that damn towel off your head; we don't need no RAGHEADS in this school!" (This comment came as a shock to me from a student at the high school where I teach...the kid was subsequently suspended and the incident goes on his permanent record.)

But finally, acceptance overcame. Now it's a part of me. One of my students said he couldn't even remember me without it, and it was just part of who I was now. That's right...it's a part of who I am. On the few occasions I have had since then where I DID take it off, for whatever reason, I felt almost naked without it. Ashamed. Guilty. I don't like feeling that way, and I will avoid it at all costs.

I am grateful for my hijab, grateful for the protection it gives me, for the sense of belonging I feel when I wear it and pass by another Muslima, a perfect stranger, and smile, saying "Salaam aleikem, oktee".

I am grateful to my mother-in-law and sister-in-law, who sent me beautiful hijabs from Saudi Arabia for me to wear, since they are harder to find in the United States. And I am happy and secure in my decision to wear this, despite all the prejudice and fear in my country right now. Al humdulillah!

Massalama,
Sister Elizabeth Alsayed

http://www.muhajabah.com/my_hijab_story/elizabeth.php