Chapter 1 Dad and New Beginnings

“So, you decided to be a Muslim now?” Dad’s eyes twinkled bright blue when he glanced up at me from behind the crumpled Guardian. “It’s probably just a phase you’re going through.” He stated, rustling thoughtfully back into the education section with a wry smile.

I stood there in front of his gaze, fiddling with my hands and not quite knowing how to react.

It was 1992; Autumn if I remember rightly, with the trees turning golden and red in their annual shedding. A few days earlier, in a dusty converted church in Netheredge, Sheffield I, a normal English girl had taken the then abnormal step, took my Shahada (declaration of faith), and became a Muslim.

Dad, a wise Professor of English Language at Sheffield University, was used to what he referred to as my ‘phases’. I had been a mechanic for a while, a terrible double glazing sales woman, a hip hop girl and all manner of other teen peculiarities a white Middle class English girl could be.

But this phase was different. This was for life.

First I suppose I should take you back to the start…my rocky start in life.

Born on the 12^th of October 1973 (incidentally the 15^th of Ramadhan), I was the illegitimate and unwanted child to a seventeen year old Liverpool girl. The local authority took me into care where I remained for the first months of my life as an orphan. But this was just the first stage of an astonishing journey.

Meanwhile, Norman Blake, a young promising English lecturer in Liverpool, and his wife, Sylvia, had been yearning for a child for years. But it wasn’t in Allah’s plan. Sylvia’s body simply couldn’t conceive. Her womb was plagued by an aggressive endometriosis which had eventually resulted in a painful hysterectomy.  So, in March 1974 they decided to adopt an unwanted baby scouser girl into their lives. Me!

My first step towards Islam had begun.

Dad and I had always been close. Even a particularly rebellious phase I went through as a revolting teenage beast had not affected our connection beyond repair. His calm demeanour and gentle mannerism had always won through the worst teentrums I could throw at him.

But that was Dad. A man who would do anything for anyone. The one who despite the world academic fame he had achieved and the scores of books he had written, would gently turn out at any time of the day or night to help others. Many a time I would find myself at hospices to visit his dying colleagues, nursing homes at Christmas to deliver a cheery smile to lonely pensioners or in airports as the sun just peeped over the horizon to collect tired travellers.

 His heart was pure and clean and he expected not a thing in return for his sacrifices.

This upbringing, undoubtedly was my first tarbeer (learning and development) from Allah swt in akhlaq (politeness and values) and treatment of others.

Unknowingly, my non Muslim Father was not only following the Sunnah of our beloved Prophet (saw) more closely than most Muslims do, but was also training me to do the same. I guess it’s similar to the upbringing of the Prophet  Muhammud (saw) who was raised with the greatest of morals and values in a non Muslim environment; first by Halima and the Makkan Bedoiun tribes  as a young child and later by his Grandfather Abdul Muttalib and Uncle Abu Talib; none of them Muslims.

We seem to emphasise the importance of a child being brought up in a Muslim environment, but nowadays we need to realise that being ‘Muslim’ doesn’t necessarily mean achievement of ‘Islamic’. What I mean to say, is that contrary to what many Muslims feel, the essence of Islamic behaviour isn’t limited to Muslim families. Morals and values are across the board regardless of family religion. The difference is the intention and ikhlaas behind the moral learning for a child. I mean the fact that in the UK 13% of the prison population are young Muslim men speaks volumes doesn’t it?

 I often wonder, what is going wrong?

So, dear reader, I must now tell you how a nightclubbing white middle class English girl like me become a hijab wearing Muslim…