I’m still struggling with my stress fracture and its two-block walk limitations, often used up within the confines of the apartment. Every time it seems closer to being healed, it swells up and aches, begging for more patience than I thought I had.

I’m longing for the freedom of my city’s lovely hills underfoot, and realizing (again) how little of life is in my control.

My halaqa (Quran’ic study group) members and I stopped off at a grocery store to get a bite to eat before our meeting. I walk very slowly right now and with a slight limp due to the stress fracture and was quickly left behind by everyone else. It’s not something I minded; I’ve come to expect the obliviousness of able-bodied friends and strangers over the past five years. It isn’t malicious, after all one of the members had agreed to go out of her way to pick me up in her car after I called to ask. It’s just that, for most people, their bodily limitations aren’t in the forefront of their daily plans or thoughts.

And, to be fair, rarely do I talk about my condition outside of this blog, so rarely does anyone but Basil slow their pace to walk beside me. Much of my silence has to do with a belief that I cannot truly convey what I went through, how crushing it was, and how indelibly it changed my life and continues to shape it.

When I was in a manual wheelchair, for example, it completely transformed the way I perceived and interacted with the world, physically and psychologically. The sudden, deep obsession with the ground: awareness of steep or uneven sidewalks, missing ramps, and towering curbs. The cars that honked impatiently as I tried to wheel myself across the street.

The simultaneous invisibility and floodlight of disability: people who didn’t notice me until they ran into the wheelchair, and others who tried too hard not to notice at all, unsure of whether even a friendly smile was permissible. Those experiences stayed with me in a way that still makes me feel like my feet might unexpectedly give out beneath me, that my reality is mutable.

And, while I think that all able-bodied people should experience that at least once in their lives, it’s not really considered civilized dinner banter.

The teacher at the halaqa mentioned that part of Islam is about companionship: the Prophet, peace and blessings upon him, interacted with his sahaba (companions) and it was through their relationships, desires, and questions that the religion spread, unfolded to, and enhanced humanity.

During a human rights delegation to Mexico, we met the Zapatistas in Chiapas who said, “We walk at the pace of the slowest.” Their idea was that sustainable and holistic development can only come to a village or community that cares for and brings along its slowest members, including the elderly, the sick, and women with children. One’s community, then, is only as strong as each of its individuals.

The teacher’s words on becoming sahaba, the Zapatistas’ ideals, and my own wheelchair-bound weeks, make me wonder: If companionship is the lifeblood of community and the foundation of nations, then, short of occasionally renting a wheelchair for oneself, how can one become a better companion on this return journey to God called life?

Starting small with one’s spouse, family, and a few community friends; embodying patience, empathy, compassion, and giving the benefit of the doubt are all good. Practical actions like taking a child out to give the mother time off to bathe, pray, reflect or nap; shortening and slowing one’s stride to match an injured friend’s; and listening to an elderly person fumble for words without interrupting impatiently, all prepare us for a state of being that could be ours at some point, given enough life and living.

But it goes beyond that in ways that I am having difficulty articulating, because it is about something deeply rooted within myself.

Walking patiently together is certainly important, but, looking at the lives of the Prophet’s companions, peace upon them all, they each had to first individually acknowledge their need, dependency, brokenness, and emptiness (ʾašhadu ʾan lā ilāha illā-llāh, wa ʾašhadu ʾanna muḥammadan rasūlu-llāh) to make space for God and the Prophet to begin filling their hearts. But it is with what followed that epiphany - challenging, lifelong implementation and struggles with each other - that they transcended tribal and blood ties and were forged into an Ummah.

I’ve got the “I need You” part down better than when I first started out. What I’m having trouble with is the “I need y’all too” bit. For years I’ve shunned Muslims because of negative experiences, and practiced Islam in a happy vacuum. But, I’m beginning to wonder if being repeatedly bedridden or homebound has ceased to simply be a way for me to realize Who is in control, and has become an opportunity to realize that I can’t and don’t have to always do it all alone, that I need and miss my community too.

I realize, too, that community is a rare gift from God, one that can give insights into our relationship with Him, our highest Companion.

There are aspects of Islam that must be learned in private, in the solitude and intimacy of night and silence, but there are also matters that can only be learned in partnership and engagement with others. I find myself leaning in with curiosity about those matters, but the idea of (cue ominous music and hushed tones) “The Community” honestly still scares the heck out of me and makes me hold back even from my friends.

I have to work on my stereotypes and prejudices and separate The Community with all its scary connotations from my community, the seven or ten wonderful Muslims that I chose to (cautiously) befriend in SF. If I’m not willing to be myself with even them, then who can I be open with? If I’m not willing to share my needs, then how can they understand them? If I “expect obliviousness” then how will I receive anything better?

Until I make an honest effort, I can’t benefit from what they have to offer, nor can my existence be beneficial to anyone else, except in the narrowest terms. So much of Islam seems to be about bringing down wall after wall within oneself and trusting that a better, more beautiful structure will eventually arise with God’s help. I’ve been trying to put the new structure in place myself and have succeeded to a degree, but I also need help.

If I issue a call for an old-fashioned barn raising, will the community come?

I’m edging closer to finding out.