"The Uncle on Non-Communicative Island"
Copyright Ras Atum-Ra Uhuru Mutawakkil 11/3/2011

This story is an analogical parable

1. There was a young man who was not much older than his beloved niece & nephew. They loved him equally as much as he loved them.

2. They played together when they were children and he was a teenager. When he got older, he still remained close to them. So close that when he bought a speedboat, he blessed it with the name of Raffae'la-Di'vi in honor of his beloved first niece & nephew.

3. Almost everyday during the summers he would take them on a daily ride in the eponymous boat, allah's sun permitting.

4. He was very generous with them. They were allowed to eat a different variety of ice cream everyday and did not have to wear their safety vest unless the water became choppy or stormy. The only rule was for them to always keep them near.

5. The other rule was they always had a fixed course coming & going into the ocean. Teaching them how to navigate in case they had to go-at-it alone and non-communicative island was the landmark and rescue point for any matter.

6. They were always told to head or swim to the east, with the current in the mornings and noon tide and against the current at night fall.

7. To hone these lessons they visited and canvassed the island. (He used techno words like that with them) and they slept there overnight to observe the water flow.

8. The uncle had some associates who were very nefarious and he used to run them from destination to destination where they did no good and partied a lot. In the Raffae'la-Di'vi. Sometimes they would even travel in raining and stormy weather.

9. One day while traveling back home alone, in a storm, the uncle hit a rogue wave and the Raffae'la Di'vi broke in half. He was knocked out and by the grace of Allah, the current delivered his unconscious body to non-communicative island. Legend will have it later on that Allah's grace was manifested and perfected by the dolphins that circumnavigate non-communicative feeding on the abundance of fish.

10. The island was rich in fruits and variety of berries and grapes. The island, thanks to him, had fishing gear and fire-making tools. So he would never starve.

11. Days passed with no one passing the island. The days went from weeks to months and from months to years without anyone coming by.

12. Because the Raffae'la-Di'vi incident injured his leg & arm, he could not swim the distance even after the years of healing. For indeed, he tried and failed, nearly drowning on numerous, desperate occasions.

13. Though resigned by his fate, he held on and out to one hope & faith that his niece and nephew would be the ones who would think to check the island for that was, after all, their special bond and rescue rounding point.

14. As the niece & nephew got older. Started having their own children and passed the summertime fun of boating in the ocean on to their children. They would tell the stories of their youth with their uncle as they passed the island, pointing out the lessons their uncle had taught them as they too taught and passed the same lessons on to their children. And so the years passed.

15. When the niece and nephew children became older and responsible, they too started boating the ocean alone and with their friends. Until one day, they decided to visit non-communicative island with some friends to BBQ and beach.

16. Upon exploring the island after BBQ lunch they discovered a sophisticated camp site. They were amazed and fearful because they were told and thought the island to be unused, save for perhaps criminals or weed growers.

17. These teens discovered an old man unconscious in the came site, who went in and out of lucidity. Using the satellite phone they had on the boat, they called the coast guard which sent the air flight.

18. While waiting for the air lift team, one of the girls asked the old man his name and how he got on the island and how long he'd been there. But he kept blacking out though they thought he was compromised by exposure that he was delusional when he said for twenty years.

19. Later that night, the niece oldest child Amina told her mother how they had visited that old abandoned island and found an old man half-dead on it from exposure. The niece inquired what did they do and where was the man now? And as she tried to sleep later on that night her inner voice would not stop disturbing her. This voice she did not want to believe as telling her the truth; that perhaps that old man could be the lost at sea uncle she had given up on. But she thought that to be unbelievable as it had been twenty two years since her uncle went missing. Yet, the nagging feelings in her stomach would not abate. So she decided to call her brother despite it being two in the morning.

20. She told her brother about the old man on the island and how she could not shake the notion that he could be their long lost at sea uncle. They decided very quickly that it wouldn't cost a thing but some time to look into it the next day. However, she could not wait, so she woke her daughter to find out what hospital the old man was taken to and she went.

21. Still in the coma, aged both by the time and island conditions. She was still able to recognize the features of her long and lost uncle. She immediately called everyone to come to the hospital.

22. The coma lasted for two weeks. When the uncle came out, he was still tired and slept for days with very little wakefulness. He ate, used the washroom and slept. So that he did not even know who the family members were that the nurses told him had been coming to visit him. He assumed they were incorrectly referring to the youth who he vaguely remember finding him on the island.

23. After fully gaining weight and vigor, he was able to stay up for the next time they came. And it was then that he saw his niece and nephew and their children, the youths who found him.

24. After explaining everything that had happened to him that day and the subsequent years, he asked his niece and nephew why they never came to the island looking for him. Their response was the most hurtful thing they had ever said, (they broke his heart) though he forgave them. They said they never had stopped thinking about him and that they had thought about checking the island but just never did, even though they passed hundreds of times.

25. Upon hearing that statement from them, the hope and faith that he had held out on, that he hung on to for so long (he had in them). Immediately, instantly vitiated and he never felt so alone in his life. At that moment, in a room full of his relatives, even more as alone as he had felt when upon that island. For even then he had always believed in them until that day, that moment.

In his mind, his niece and nephew were not the kind of people to neglect family. To hold off for years and then regret later. His were not the kind to come to his funeral crying and stuffed with regret over not having done this or that or stayed in contact.

26. He passed away that night. Legend says he didn't die of the wear and tear on his body. As the doctors could not give a definitive answer, they were shocked by his death too, but died of a broken heart. Broken after the revelation that his family had given up on him, that they had regulated his existence to a mere memory. The kind of "thinking of people do to the dead." And so, this is why the island's legend say the Non-Communicative island is Now Communicative. For his spirit has never rest and still inhabits the island. Waiting for his real niece and nephew to come looking to rescue him.

27. That is perhaps derived from the fact that his niece and nephew children insisted that he be buried back on the island on the grounds of his sophisticated campsite where they found him.

28. The lesson in this parable, if not already evident, is never assume that telepathy is a sufficient way to communicate your love to the people you say you love and care for. For telepathy while existing between family and loved ones is rare and divided to extraordinary events and not consistent and sufficient for the normal and proper duty of communication. A letter, email, phone call. But the crown of them all: a face to face visit.

29. How cold is that, to say to someone, "I know I didn't write or call or visit! But I was always thinking about you." Cold as the old man was on the island. With the ocean night winds coming on the evening tide knowing that your loved ones and boats passed by time and after time, that's how cold.

30. When the Bible and all creation stories say that the existence of human kind started with the issuance of a word, that among the second or implied as part of the first gift. Which is the gift of life. Shows that communication is a gift to all from Allah.

31. As my shaykh says, we have but a limited time in this world, after which we vanish from it. The years pass whether one agrees or not. The choice is whether to use their inevitable flow to one's advantage or disadvantage.

Communicate more and often
Love

Written by Shadhili Tariqua Murid Wa Muqallid Shafiiyah Madhdhab Ras Atum-Ra Uhuru Mutawakkil