Writer Mary Catherine Ford says - in an article published by the Washington Post newspaper - that she is filling her home with a new life in her first Ramadan after she converted to Islam, despite the suffering imposed by the epidemic of the Corna virus.

She says that with the closure of mosques, the banning of community gatherings, and the closure of holy sites in Mecca and Medina, nearly two billion Muslims in the world are celebrating Ramadan in isolation for the first time.

She adds that she is fasting Ramadan, where she lives in Queens - New York City's five largest neighborhoods - the epicenter of the Corna virus (Covid-19).

She points out that this year she fasts, prays and celebrates Ramadan with her Muslim family, as she is a new convert to Islam.

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Twenty years

"I have been in support of my Muslim husband and two Muslim children for twenty years, while I have been keeping my Catholicism strong," she says.

Throughout these years, Ramadan was the most time of the year that represented its isolation, because it meant the necessity of moving away from the people you love most.

The writer notes that many Muslims feel sad during Ramadan this year, because they have lost the attribute of assembly that they are used to.

She explains that the neighborhood you live in last March transformed overnight, from a noisy and vibrant area to a place where dark and silent store fronts prevailed.

High injuries

She points out that SK infections in Queens have since risen to 51,000, and empty streets, isolation and fear have replaced life.

She adds that her family tried to maintain a normal life within her narrow apartment, but that normal life is impossible in light of the fact that her husband is unemployed and their teenage children struggle with distance learning, while she always seeks a quiet corner for writing.

However, the author says that despite all this suffering, and after converting to Islam, her daily program of life has differed, adding that she is joining her husband and two children in the living room to pray five times a day.

She says that when she prostrates, anxiety comes out of her head and is replaced by peace.

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A long way

And she adds that her path to Islam was longer than that of many who embraced it, because for years she was happy with her marriage to a devout Muslim and raising their children in a religion other than her religion. She converted to Islam only last year.

Mary says that she and her family were visiting her husband's family in North Africa last summer, when the voice of the muezzin who was spreading across the city waking her up to dawn.

She adds that she woke up and realized that the words of the call to prayer were not just for others, and that Islam was not something outside of itself, but rather was present within it.

Now, spring arrives in New York, but this year a surreal fear of being outdoors came with him.

And it indicates that the dogwood trees near her apartment were filled with flowers, in addition to brittle saffron and narcissus flowers and lily in the small garden on the street, but in light of this epidemic she sees the spring mostly in the dark.

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Spring and dark

She and her husband walk in the evening when the streets are largely empty, and in the dark she hardly notices the flowers open.

However, she says she finds spring inside her apartment, and she talks a lot about the plants she planted inside the apartment and those that stretch and hang through the windows.

The author also talks about how happy she is to see the flowering of the various types of seeds she has planted in some household utensils.

And she refers to the hadith of the Messenger of God, may God’s prayers and peace be upon him, “If the hour is up and someone has a hand, then if he can not stand until he has planted it, let him plant it.”

She also talks about Ramadan food in her home, before she concludes that she feels comfortable while filling her home with a new life in her first Ramadan after her conversion to Islam, expressing the hope that God will lift this epidemic.