hijab and 7 years old

Sometimes, when I stumbled across stories like this, I feel the sudden urge of gratitude to whoever inspired the story that I feel like writing them a letter, or something.

It's not difficult to amaze me.

"Hijab and abaya, at 7 years old"

As walked into the grocery store, I saw this small girl, 7 years old, wearing an abaya and hijab, playing with her sister and little brother. I smiled at her and she gave me the biggest smile I’ve seen in years, back. I walked away, still smiling. As I turned away I heard her say excitedly, “Baba! Baba! There’s another girl wearing hijab like me!” I just smiled more, not being able to help listening to their conversation taking place 5 feet away.

After 5 minutes, her, her dad, and her two siblings walked by. Her father shot a glance at me and then turned to my brothers and said, “Salam alaykum.” My little brother didn’t know how to respond properly and the older one was shy so I responded back saying, “Wa alaykum salam.” Her father was astonished. He started smiling and he slowly walked away.

When I was in the cereal aisle, I watched the little girl skip, jump, and run through the ocean of carts in front of her. When she reached the end of the aisle, she turned around and did the same thing again, and occasionally guarding her little brother from adults who didn’t care to watch where they were going. I then realized my little brother, who is 9, was watching her as well. When she came to our end of the aisle, she stopped and looked at my brother and smiled. My brother started following her and playing with her and her brother too. When she got tired, my brother, Nabil, asked her, “Why do you wear the hijab and abaya if you’re younger than me? Why doesn’t your sister wear it too? Does your baba force you?”

I told Nabil to be quiet because he was being rude and I could see that she was taken aback by his sudden question. He quickly apologized and looked away and to both our surprise, she answered. MashAllah she answered so defiantly I almost started crying.

She bravely looked up at my brother and me and said, “I wear the hijab because Allah swt told me to wear the hijab. My baba doesn’t want me to wear it and my sister doesn’t understand. I love my hijab! I can wear a hijab with flowers and butterflies and leaves and dots and stripes and anything I want! It’s really cool!”

I stood there, dumbfounded. My brother of course, was even more curious now. “Do you ever miss showing your hair? You can’t do cool hairstyles or wear dresses or anything. And what if you grow up and want to take it off?” I nudged him and told him to shut up.

She then replied again, “Why do other people need to see my hair, what for? It’s my hair and they shouldn’t care. I’m doing this for Allah swt not for other people. If I ever want to take it off, I’ll remember Allah swt and he will give me strength. And I have a lot of dresses and I wear them all the time! I’m wearing a dress right now, aren’t I?”

Nabil just stared at her and said, “So how did you know that Allah swt wants you to wear it?”

And she said, “Because I read it in the Quran.”

He looked at her and said, “C’mon. Let’s go play again!”

As I waited for my mum to finish shopping, I watched her, my brother, and their imaginary friends play various games. She was the first person to ever truly captivate me. I find everyone interesting really, but I just couldn’t grasp her. She was so special and she changed everything for me.

This little, 7 year old girl had already made her decision. She already places her trust in Him. She’s following Allah’s swt decree and not her fathers or any other human’s. And here I am, still contemplating whether or not I’m going to keep wearing it only part time or not. Here I am, almost 16, just about ready to stop wearing the hijab completely for stupid reasons while she is devoting herself as much as possible to Allah swt and His command.

She truly inspired me to wear it soon and nothing will ever be able to express how thankful I am for her. She is so beautiful mashAllah inside and out and someday, I hope to be as amazing as her, a 6 six year old. I hope she never changes and inshAllah she is granted the highest level of Jannah. 

Alhamdulillah.

(source : here)

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