After reading Faithful Families (and dog - earing nearly every page for Dan), I felt relieved — relieved I didn't have to understand theodicy before praying a simple blessing over my son's
bed at
night, relieved I didn't have to know all the answers before staring in awe into a
starry sky, relieved I didn't have to be free of doubt to be full of gratitude at our family's «gratitude café.»
Because when you're ten years old and getting ready for
bed, on a
night that's just like any other
night, no darker or
starrier or more silent or more full of smells than usual, with the familiar sound of the muezzins calling the faithful to prayer from the tops of the minarets just like anywhere else... no, when you're ten years old - I say ten, although I'm not entirely sure when I was born, because there's no registry office or anything like that in Ghazni province - like I said, when you're ten years old, and your mother, before putting you to
bed, takes your head and holds it against her breast for a long time, longer than usual, and says, There are three things you must never do in life, Enaiat jan, for any reason... The first is use drugs.