Aaliyah Edwards Quotes

So everything Aaliyah said was bullshit? The stories, the mother tongue . . . all of it?” Tariq sighs. “As with any religion, there are aspects which are clearly truth, aspects which are clearly myth, and aspects which are more or less uncertain. I looked into these issues when I was younger, and first began to doubt. The so-called mother tongue is a grammatically consistent and complete language. It bears some similarities to ancient African tongues. Is it truly the language of the mother-of-all? Who is to say? The stories, the myths—these are things passed to us from our mother. Do they truly stretch back over three thousand generations? Perhaps they do. Or, perhaps they were devised thirty years ago from whole cloth. How are we to know?

Have you ever owned a dog?” I smile. “Sure, when I was young. He was a beagle. We called him Ajax.” “Was he happy?” I have to think about that. “Yes, I think so. He was a dog. What’s not to be happy about?” She nods. “Did it bother him to know that he would live only a few years, that his whole life would barely span your childhood? Did it bother him to know that your father would have him put to sleep as soon as he became inconvenient to keep?” I shake my head. “That’s not what happened. But even if it were, no, it wouldn’t have bothered him. He was a dog. He didn’t know anything about that.” “No,” she says. “He did not. He knew that his belly was full, or that it was not. He knew that his ears were being scratched, or that they were not. This was enough for him. Is this not so?” I shrug. “I suppose so.” “A dog knows nothing of time, and a dog knows nothing of death. He lives in an eternal present, with no concern for what occurred yesterday, or for what will come tomorrow. This is the source of his happiness. If you could have told Ajax what the future had in store for him, would you have done so?” I give her a long look. I have no idea where she’s going with this. “I didn’t know what the future had in store for him,” I say finally. “He got hit by a car when I was twelve.” Aaliyah sighs loudly. “But if you had known, and could have told him, would you have done so?” “No,” I say. “Why would I do that?” She nods again, as if I’ve just made her point. “This is why Tariq asked me not to speak to you of the faith.” It takes a minute for that to sink in. “So in this scenario, I am the dog?” “Yes, Elise. You are the dog.

What do you know,” Aaliyah says, “of the history of our people?” “Depends on what you mean,” I say. “My people come from Norway. I’m guessing yours are from somewhere very different.” She shakes her head, and her eyes narrow. “No,” she says. “What you say is a mistake. We are all one people. All who are alive today are one people, though it was not always so. In the time of the mother-of-all, there were many peoples, and we were not the strongest. Our cousins spread across the breadth of the old world. Some were taller and swifter. Others were stronger and hardier. We huddled in one corner of Africa, few in number, and dwindling.” I remember this vaguely, from an anthropology class in college. “Right,” I say. “But then something happened. The Great Leap Forward.” “Yes,” she says. “The Great Leap Forward. The Great Leap Forward was the faith.

So,” says Aaliyah. “Was my brother right in his fears? Has meeting his mad sister caused you to regret your hasty decision to wed?” I smile, raise my teacup to my lips and sip. “Not yet,” I say. “There’s a very thin line between crazy and wise. I still haven’t decided which side you’re on.” She laughs. We’re sitting across from each other at the table in the sitting room, with a pot of tea and a plate of sticky sweet rolls between us.