Allah fashioned the human, as well as every type of creature, to naturally interact with similar creatures. The closer these two creatures are, the more they will interact and become similar to each other in their manners and characteristics, to the point that one would be unable to distinguish between them except in terms of their physical appearance. –ibn Taymiyyah
Consider my interaction with high school girls. Now on a regular basis we have a very, “I’m the teacher, you’re the student” kind of relationship. I give them homework, they do it, turn it in to me, I grade it and turn it back to them, we rinse and repeat if desired. That’s our daily routine. But every once in a while, I’m given the opportunity to hang out with the girls, away from the instruction, and be with them when they aren’t students, but just… girls.
Yesterday at work we had our Eid celebration which included the girls going bowling and then to Old Country Barf-fest. When we first got to the bowling alley, I was pretty calm and chill, sitting with the other teachers and acting “my age.” After a while I got kinda… I don’t want to say bored, but I guess fidgety. So I hopped up off my seat to go mingle with my students. I figured now was the perfect time to get to know them, outside of the classroom, away from all the homeworulerk, quizzes, tests and disciplining.
I was hovering around some 9th grade girls from Geometry and Algebra 1, and they offered to let me in on their next game. So to be polite, I accepted their invitation. At first it started off pretty slow. They were acting nuts-o with one another, and I just watched, waited my turn, and missed my own friends from high school and they way we were. But after awhile, I was bit by the teenage girl bugg. They were all acting so goofy and cooky with one another, and then with me too, that it turned into one of those, “You wanna go nuts?! Let’s go nuts!” kinda moments. One of them was pretending to be a sports commentator giving a play-by-play of our game, and getting reactions from everyone. She was holding a pretend air mic. I suggested she use a shoe 
And she did! She interviewed all of us about our feelings about the game. Then later, one of them was bowling so slow, I called her a granny and we were all in an uproar of giggles. It got worse because the granny-bowler squatted low to push the ball with a spin down the lane and slipped and fell on her back. Her friends immediately grabbed their phones and cameras to capture the moment with some pictures.
After leaving the “juveniles” I went to hang out with my adult co-workers. We decided to have our own game of bowling. However, after being around high school girls all morning, we turned into a bunch of goofy girls ourselves. We gave each other stupid names on the display TV including Runs with Small Feet and I don’t knw wat. We were all taking jabs at each other for stinking up a storm on the lanes, but I was doing the worst by far. I was bowling soo poorly, that after getting my 5th gutter ball in a row, in a fit of anger and embarassment, I did an Ayesha-collapse in the middle of the lane. After that my friends were in a fit of giggles and chasing me with a camera phone to take pictures. hehehehe.
It gets worse. As I mentioned earlier we went to OCB and while we were eating together, my friends started bugging me and teasing me and taunting me with something really stupid. I got so frustrated that I picked up a pepper shaker and dumped it over one of my friends’ brownies and cheesecake. She flipped and got pretty jokingly upset with me. We laughed it off and moved on.
About five minutes later I saw some high school students sitting in the booth behind us. When one of the girls’ friends turned away from her food, the girls picked up a glass of Coke and poured it over their friend’s bowl! I was so ticked that they were wasting food that way, that I felt the need to point it out to them. However, after I finished, my own friend gave me this look like, “Yea right!” because I had JUST finished putting pepper all over her dessert!!
What’s my age again? Am I a high school girl? Or a 22 year old married teacher?
Long story short: it is true what ibn Taymiyyah says. If you hang out with a certain group of people (good or bad) you end up picking up their habits and acting like them. In my case it’s a bit dangerous because I’m with teenage girls all day, and I’m 22 years old! I shouldn’t act like I did about 7 years ago, I should act my age… right?
Has this ever happened to any of you? Prolonged exposure to a certain group of people caused you to act like them?
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9 Responses for "What’s My Age Again?"
LAUGHOUTLOUD you are truly Ayesha “that girl” Siddique!
hehe and don’t worry, i wasn’t really upset about my peppered brownie, i just blew most of it off… and into your face!
alhamdulillah, wasn’t it a blast? i can’t remember the last time i laughed that much at work!
I definitely know what you’re talking about. At the Apple Store, I see fellow co-workers adapt behaviors of other co-workers that aren’t necessarily the most admirable.
BUT on the flip side, a lot of them know that they can’t talk about “bad stuff” near me or to me, so they kind of change their attitude when they’re around me, which is kind of cool that I’ve been able to influence them in that way.
Wow I remember IFS, the good ol’ days.
P.S. is it sad that I totally thought of the crappiest band ever when I read this title? Blink 182…gross.
My friends are all young adults college-aged for the most part. Acting your age is overrated. I’m older than all the people i know close to my age, and most of them are currently wondering what’s going wrong with their 401(k)s, their mortgages, and their stocks.
I, on the other hand, have been spending my money and enjoying myself tremendously. My wife just bought me a Wii and I’ve been rediscovering my old gaming habits. I’m loving Mario Kart online and I’ve got about 10 other games and lots of controllers with nunchuks (4), so anyone who wants to come over for a Wii party, hit up my place!
Siraaj
Hey, can I have a job that pays me to bowl and eat brownie sundaes? I’m guessing it’s not as glorious when the rest of the 180 days of interacting with 13 and 14 year olds is taken in account, but still, I’m down! Seriously though, I really admire those type of outings with Islamic schools, totally builds community character, something you simply cannot find in public schools.
As for the whole acting like who you hang out with, and specifically with youngins, when my 15 year old cousin Saad came to stay in my house for two months with my 15 year old brother Waasiq, I hung out with them everyday. Ask Ayesha, her husband who she just moved in with didn’t take very long to act like a 15 year old himself. Imitation is the highest form of flattery, right? SubhanAllah how amazing is He who made us! Props on the reflection to Ibn Tamiyyah, rahimuhullah.
Also, a teacher once told me about living with roommates, that they will either have an effect on you or you will have an effect on them. Question is, which one will it be? Will we leave our living with others benefiting people, doing nothing for them, or even worse, bringing them harm. It’s a scary scenario to think about when push will come to shove on the Day of Standing.
@Siraaj
Playing video games at your age isn’t not acting your age. Me having fart noise simulation competitons with my cousin and brother during the summer, is. but back to the video games thing, culturally speaking, maybe in our times it’s not “mature” to play video games, and to only rent and not dive into loans and mortgages. But hey man, bump culture and society and just be yourself!
@AbdelRahman
No, because by the time I scrolled down to your comment, I was already at the guitar solo bridge of the song in my head. That’s sad!
Aliya, it was your brownie? lol, yes im sure you got momentarily ticked and your eyebrows arched nice and high giving you your usual Mafia face but then it blew over =)
Oh man, this Wii….at least its better then watching him surf the net, and I can get back in touch with my high school N64 days. but the marvel spiderman comic book game i just cant get in to. i prefer the mommy-daugther moments with Amatullah and her horse game, which keeps me nice and mature
masha’Allah, never would’ve thought of this application to the quote.
I agree with Saqbib, it’s a good thing that Islamic schools do this kind of stuff cuz that’s what really separates them from a public school. So many kids in public school get lost because they hang around crowds that aren’t either Muslim or somewhat practicing Muslims. It’s really a problem amongst high school kids nowadays. Of all the kids I’ve seen, the ones that stay close to the masjid or Muslims in general end up better than the ones who hang around kuffar only.
It’s good to have teachers that can serve as friendly role models of what one can be while still practicing and preserving their Islam in this culture. High school kids tend to think that Islam is dull and that’s usually because they never see the ‘practicing people’ chilling out playing nintendo Wii until 12:30am. Alhamdulilah, we had that in high school (at least my group did), I think we need to set an example for this next generation insha’Allah.
Consider yourself lucky that you had high school girls. I had 5th graders, and by the end of the year was eyeing their gel pen collections. When we went to the NatSci museum for a field trip, I told them the greenhouse on the Diag was where Prof Sprout taught Herbology and the Chem building was where Prof Snape taught Potions (the old part of the building, obviously). The thing I miss most about that job is that it keeps you young at heart.
Yup, I’ve definitely noticed the same thing!
I’ve gone through phases (due to changing circumstances):
- Back when the only people I was able to hang out were my mom and her friends. This meant that at the age of 13, I was well-versed in fiqh of women’s issues, and was privy to such fascinating and graphic information on what to expect during every stage of pregnancy.
- Finally introduced to a handful of girls my age! We were all a little nuts (see above), so tried to self-therapy on ourselves by plotting world domination instead. Oh, for those days of running around in the park, ‘abaayas flapping in the wind… *sighs*
- Now I spend 2 hours of 3 days a week with children aged 5 – 12, and get to see/ interact with actual grownups approximately once a week (at Jumu’ah). I’ll leave you to deduce how that’s affected me!
22 isn’t a whole lot older
hehe
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