Language

Bismillah-ir-Rahman-ir-Raheem.

Assalam alaikum wr wb.

I've been wondering about language. The way the familiarity of words and cadences comforts, yet also exclude - co-workers who speak a foreign language, of in-jokes and teases that sound like gibberish to your ears, but you can't ask people to explain them because there really is no explanation why their mind picked that particular linguistic blip to replay over and over again.

As you know, I have social anxiety. I've been yearning for a relationship, a husband and children for decades now. Yet very recently, I realised with a sinking feeling…how can an outsider ever fit into my kinky family?

I've been watching British sitcoms since I was five. 'Allo 'Allo, Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em, Are You Being Served?...etc. All the comedic greats. I've seen them so many times – SO MANY TIMES – that we can quote them backwards and forwards. All I need to do is yell, "Mr. Bedford!" in a fey voice and my brother will crack up. Add to that Back to the Future, Star Wars, Indiana Jones and a few other movies and TV shows like Signs and the Gettysburg mini-series and you have a near-impenetrable familial "secret" language.

Somehow I expect any man I have a relationship with to understand us. Yet how could anyone have exactly the same cultural upbringing as I?

My counsellor said that certain social skills, only developed in practice, are somewhat underdeveloped with me, due to my self-inflicted seclusion. I think one of those might be relating to people with whom I haven't grown up. This includes my cousins, co-workers, friends, strangers, even though everyone is a stranger before they are a friend. And how am I supposed to make new friends if I can't talk to strangers? And then what I deem to be my social ineptitude causes me to self-criticize, which then leads me back to my books and family and blowing every social faux-pas way out of proportion. It's a vicious circle.

So I've decided to – and I'm aware that this is probably akin to jumping into the sea when I don’t even know how to swim – MAYBE entertain proposals. My parents say that offers are flooding in for my hand in marriage. I can't think why I'm such hot property. Part of this sudden interest in marriage is because one of the characters in a novel I'm writing is going through the arranged marriage process and I want to become more familiar with what he's going through.

Well. The doctor said I should stop thinking of myself as sick. And I think the main reason I have been shunning all these winsome men is because I've considered myself unable to take the strain. Well, I'm not. They're just people. Not monsters. There's no reason why I shouldn't be able to relate to them as such. Granted, the very idea turns my stomach to water. But that's normal...isn't it?

I shall mull, perform Istikhara and get back to you.

Wassalam and Fee Amanillah.
Zed.