“Beautiful things don’t ask for attention. In essence, beauty attracts attention but true beauty does not seek it out.” 1
For a long time, I’ve been trying to birth the written word - book, short story, a publication, anything. I have toiled for years. I’ll revisit the same essay or short story I wrote years ago, and it never feels ready. Or I don’t feel ready to receive yet another rejection. I haven’t submitted to magazines because I know I’ll get rejected. So the status update on my fiction manuscript is paused. Birthing a book is not easy. Neither is birthing a baby, but a baby is sort of on autopilot but writing the book is not. I hope to one day finish this beautiful thing I’ve been working on forever.
Today marks the end of Season 2 of Ugly Shoes.
I feel both joy and sadness at how quickly I’ve reached this milestone.
It feels like yesterday I started playing around with Substack, trying to open an online bank account, and taking writing classes. Now, I have a home for my writing, and a constellation of essays that orient towards faith and spirituality as a Muslim mother. My work touches on Sufism more than anything else, and I seek spiritual truth and knowledge through writing. I do this alongside changing diapers and cleaning vomit.
As a full-time caregiver, my work is mostly invisible.
As a mother and chief memory-maker in my household, I want to share my wins because no one else will document the progress. No one says, “good job” for doing your job, as a mother, as a creative, as a Muslim, as a writer.
During this season of Ugly Shoes:
I’ve shared some 30+ essays and had some great conversations offline
I’ve written through family travels, vacations, sickness, no sleep, a global genocide, and even moments when I thought the world or myself was dying, I just kept writing. It’s like Dory saying “Just keep swimming.”
I’ve tried some social experiments as a writing community:
This fabulous community of readers collectively gave $1000 to PCRF in December
This community of readers trusted me with duas 2which I read during the last 10 nights
I wrote about “blood in the brain” as the metaphor for the Muslim genocide, in this safe place of substack, when Israel started a holocaust of Muslim lives. I’ve been writing about how the ummah is hemorrhaging and finding others who share this sense of unyielding horror, like we’re living in a nightmare we can’t wake up from.
I am grateful for your attention, support, and engagement.
I am especially grateful to my parents and my in-laws for making it possible for me to pursue my craft. I am especially grateful that they are feeding the kids. I don’t know how many parathas I’ve burned because I was thinking about my next essay draft.
As the daughter of an accountant, paying my business taxes is probably as good as it gets. I am paying taxes on my small business this year!
I’m grateful to each of my subscribers, and I feel like I know the majority of my readers on some level. Maybe we met at a kid pool party, or a school book fair, or a play date. Maybe we met at a gathering. Maybe we met years ago at a friend’s party, where I told you my dream was to be a writer one day. Maybe we’ve never met in person, and you found me another way. Whatever brought you here, I’m glad you’re here.
So thanks for supporting my dream of being a digital creative!
This week, I voice-recorded Dear Beloved Daughter after a long hiatus from recording my essays.
This one felt important to record because it’s part of the gift I wanted to give my child and my mother, who does not read English as her first language. I listened to the essay with my daughter before bedtime. She started to cry when I talked about death. Maybe I could have left the death section out? I gave her a lot of hugs and kisses that did not soothe her. I know as a culture, Americans don’t typically talk about death, evaluation or hypocrisy with their 9-year-olds, let alone their families. But I’m not typical.
Another friend told me she read the letter with her 10-year-old daughter. The essay sparked conversation. This is why I write, to have some kind of positive effect.
I hadn’t imagined the letter could be something for mothers-daughters to do together, and I’m grateful I could write something that could be shared across generations of Muslim girls and women. The letter is just a start, another experiment, and I encourage you to read the original Ghazali text, and write your own letter to a loved one.
Entering a Different Season
I came across this idea of Seasons in the Writing Life from
and wanted to incorporate her brilliant idea into today’s reflection. There are different seasons in a writer’s life. Having written 80+ essays in a year, I’ve just finished a season of intense writing and discovery online. But I can’t stay there forever.Here’s her full essay if you’re curious:
I am entering a period of rest as a writer.
This publication needs some time to sleep and breathe. Maybe it needs a rebrand and a marketing intern. My eldest keeps asking, “But why are the shoes ugly?”
I also need some time to sleep and just breathe as I prepare for another stage.
A Question for You
What season of writing/life are you in? Let’s meet in the comments.
Here are 3 of my favorite essays to reread while I am away until June 30th. I’ve removed the paywall so you can access them anytime:
I explore some lessons from taking a class on the most beautiful love poem, the Burda. I am not a poet. I am not a scholar. But I was moved by the presence and commitment to study and learn together.
Peter Sanders. Meeting with Mountains. (140)
This will stay open until May 30th 2024.
This is beautiful.
I’m in autumn. One of the openings I came to in Ramadan was that my own hopes of one day writing a book are much closer that I dreamed. My goal is by next Eid I can write 4 more articles and then take 3 months to re-write and expand my articles into a book, InshaAllah. It’s so exciting, Al-Humdulillah. Allah bless us in our aspirations!
I’m rooting for you!!!
Hi Sadia! I just recently joined “Together Write Now” and checked out the link you shared on the WhatsApp group (hope to virtually meet you soon, too). Your essay really resonated, as a Muslim mother and writer myself. I haven’t read the other essay you shared, but if I had to describe which season I’m in right now, I think it would be a re-birth of some kind, in which I’m finally using my agency to become the person I was always meant to be, and spark change through my words, to create the world I wish to see. As for ugly shoes, I love them! I see the beauty in the comfort they give me, and have sworn off heels for life, despite the fact that my “little” one is now a teenager. I’m looking forward to reading your previously posted essays. Enjoy your break!😊