What It Means - Day 10

I'm not certain why this popped up in my head this morning, but following my promise to myself to post what I'm thinking about that day (or at least the day I wrote the post, since, as with Proust and the Discography I often wrote the post much earlier and trusted the nano overlords to release it per our agreed upon schedule), but Ramadan starts at sunset on Sunday 5 May.  I'll be turning in my grades that night by midnight so I guess my students won't have a built-in excuse for me grading through harshly based on being weary or grumpy.  It does mean that I'll be fasting throughout the entire Collaborative, although I don't really know what form it's taking this year (or if it has survived), so it will be my colleagues or more likely various and sundry administrators who feel my hungry/sleepy wrath. Last year my good friend Cyndi and a fellow Muslim professor and me out to her house to break the fast on the first day of Ramadan (because she a truly excellent soul). As we were waiting to eat one of my other friends proposed, "You must be really excited about the start of Ramadan?" The Muslim crew replied, unplanned, essentially the same thing at the same time: "Uh, no, not really."  It's not that we didn't appreciate what Ramadan means - and I'll have a lot more to say about that in upcoming posts - but we also clearly weren't that jazzed to get started.  It's truly exhausting, and if you're a convert it also tends to be a very lonely time of year. Nevertheless, I do think I enjoy it more every passing Ramadan, or at least I appreciate it more every year.  One of the central themes which I know will run throughout this year will be my personal struggle between the more internal and external aspects of my faith.  In regards to Ramadan the example would be brothers or sisters who critique you, albeit gently, for not fasting enough hours in the day, whereas to me the much more important issue is what you do with those hours. If it's nothing more than not eating, and calling attention to the fact that you're not eating, then it can quickly become an almost onanistic celebration of yourself, which I would argue is clearly not the point of the entire effort. Having said that, I will be fasting more hours this year.  Technically, we're supposed to fast from the morning prayer, around 3:30 a.m. in the middle of summer, until sunset. I've never fasted that many hours.  During my first Ramadan I woke up at my normal time of 5:30 a.m., quickly ate, and then fasted until sunset.  Then two years ago I started the process at 5:00.  It began at 4:30 last year, and this year I'm setting the alarm at 4:00.  Will there be naps during the day?  Oh yes, most certainly.  However, despite my personal war between the internal and external aspects of the faith I'm also clearly working towards a more "traditional" fast.  Obviously, much more on this later.  As I mentioned above I am writing some of this early (for instance, I'm writing this the morning of 20 February) but I suspect in Ramadan I'll be writing most of those posts "live" to be more in the moment.