I love Islam and cream soda

In 2000, Shwayyah got married for the first time, to a young brother from Egypt named Mohammed. The backdrop of this event saw me and her mother Asiyah going thru a brief separation, one that extended to my relationship with Shwayyah as well. In the meantime, Mohammed approached some of the brothers in my mosque, inquiring about marriage to any available sisters - they brought up Shway for consideration and one of the brothers in a leadership role, Mikal, stepped into the role as her wali (representative), a role that was mine traditionally but for my absence... Asiyah and I reconciled as Shway's marriage entered its final stages of confirmation - the signing of the marriage contract. It was a poignant time because one of the things that drove our separation was us battling over my role as head of household and as a father and stepfather. My marriage to Asiyah was my first, but her third, and it came after a long period where she was a single divorcée of 4 kids and, I felt, us...

By 2007, I had been training at Edge MMA (then known as Grapplers Edge), for about 3 quiet years, concentrating mostly on Jujitsu and nogi grappling. One Saturday, I was visiting the Denver County Jail as a volunteer chaplain for Islamic services​, driving directly from an Open Mat grappling session, so I was wearing an Edge t-shirt at the time. One of the deputies approached me in the hallway and asked me where I had gotten my shirt. I told him that I got it from the school that I train at. The deputy frowned and replied that he trained there as well and had never seen me there... “Hmmm…Is this another of those challenges?” I wondered - it was commonly known at the jail that I was an ex-con who was now providing religious services to inmates and I had clashed with a deputy or two who did not necessarily respect me or what I was doing because of my past; so my hackles went up immediately at this possibly becoming another one of those incidents. I told the deputy that I had prima...