Showing results by narrator "Tim S" in All Categories

J. R. Cleckler graduated from the University of Alabama with a bachelor’s degree in history/English, with a minor in political science. A planned future in academia was set aside, and many years in retail ensued. The recent events with the pandemic provided the time and opportunity to pursue a dream of writing.

Zayneb’s teacher won’t stop reminding the class how “bad” Muslims are. But Zayneb, the only Muslim in class, isn’t bad. She’s angry. When she gets suspended for confronting her teacher and he begins investigating her activist friends, Zayneb heads to her aunt’s house in Doha, Qatar, for an early start to spring break. Fueled by the guilt of getting her friends in trouble, she resolves to try out a newer, “nicer” version of herself in a place where no one knows her. Then her path crosses with Adam’s.

Adam is in Doha, Qatar, making a map of the Hijra, a historic migration from Mecca to Medina, and worried about where his next paycheck will come from. Zayneb is in Chicago, where school and extracurricular stresses are piling on top of a terrible frenemy situation, making her miserable. Then a marvel occurs: Adam and Zayneb get the chance to spend Thanksgiving week on the Umrah, a pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina, in Saudi Arabia.

Life is made up of billions of moments linked together. Each moment is important. Once a moment passes you can never recapture it. The moments of your life pile together to form your world, good or bad. Now, what if you took each moment and wrung the beauty and potential from it? Imagine this life. But how do you know what potential lies in the moment? Through fear and indecision, and perhaps laziness, we let these moments slip away.