Segregation is thus a reality. A reality created or perpetuated by people like me. Of course, I refer to my past “me”, before the process that shook my convictions and took them to a different level.
Of course, it has been a gradual process, and I must admit at the time I met Iqbal - two and a half years ago- I was not yet capable of recognising my misconceptions.
I dread to recall how easy has been for me to generalise and put him, his family, his religion and his community into a box , frenziedly carried away by my stereotypical views on Muslim society. These views have been flooding our relationship from the start, during the time when we were just friends, and I could barely accept the idea of being “mixed” with such diversity and forming a real family with him. First of all, I did not want a relationship with him because I pictured it as the most complicate thing on heart and because I thought his religious and cultural background would always be in the way as a serious, insurmountable obstacle between us. There were also the fears connected with family and friends acceptance to worn me down. This explosive cocktail of delusion and fears has been my companion for the first year. I kept worrying about so many things. How Iqbal would influence my son's beliefs? Would he try to force him into this horrible religion? How would I cope with meeting his family- a family used to the idea of arranged marriages (oh my God! would they try to kill me or poison me?). Reflecting on my past fears hands me over a sense of ridicule now. Now that I am so much confident of our strength as a family. Now that I know our differences will be our force and by no means a weakness to be afraid of.
But how did this happens? How did my stereotypical views on Muslim men slowly turn into a different knowledge? How did my fears transform into this wonderful feeling of safety being beside him? It is fairly simple: I started to judge him for what he REALLY is. I started to realise that all my initial conjectures about the way he was were in fact only pure fantasy, and the man with whom I was sharing my days was entirely a different person.
I figured out he did not want impose any religious view on me or Guido, and neither on our future kids. He appreciates my reasoning of ex-catholic and he's willing to discuss my convinced anti-religious views. In fact, we can spend hours debating about the nature of religion; we might get into heated discussion about this matter, but until I know we mutually respect our views, there will be no reason for concern.
After a year spent together (and the same now, after two years), and several attempts on my part to fit him into “the box” I had so blindly constructed for him, I could not find any evidence of womanising behaviour: this man just did not fit into my box!
I had to change perspective and look at the way we were really getting along as a couple and as a family: despite my lies and deceiving conduct during the first year, I had a man who respected me and trusted me, no matter what.
Maybe for the first time- after twenty years of battling my feelings in desperate and tumultuous relationships- I was meant to discover harmonious love: somehow and somewhat, something that I've always assumed incompatible with my own nature.
