Celebrating Children’s Differences with Jahidah Diaab

Lynnette Arthur (LA): Well hello and welcome to another episode of the Powerful Pedagogy. I am Lynnette Arthur and with me today is one of my near and dear friends, playwright, author, filmmaker and children’s book publisher now Jahidah Diaab, who has been working in the field of education for over 30 years now, and just holds within her a wealth of information that I am so looking forward to her sharing with us today. So Jahidah Diaab welcome, welcome.

Jahidah Diaab (JD): I’m so happy to be here on your platform. 

LA: Thank you. Thank you, darling. 

JD: This is awesome. This is great to talk to you. 

LA: Because now you know, we’re talking you know, the minds of young, amazing, you know, learners. And one of the things that I have to say that I’ve always admired about your practice your pedagogy is just the creativity that you bring into your classroom like all you know, Jahidah, she brings stuff from her garden, you know, she’ll find, you know, leaves or a sunflower and the children will paint with it like literally like she brings all aspects of nature and, and creativity and abstract art into the room. And I think one of the things that I’ve always been curious about is like, what inspires you to do that? Like, like, what inspires you to like, walk out in your backyard, see something and just say, like, you know what, I’m gonna bring this to work today, and we’re going to explore this?

JD: You know, I don’t know, I think it’s how I grew up. Like I grew up waking up at, you know, I grew up in the Nation of Islam. So we woke up at 4am every morning to pray. So when the sun came up, I was outside barefoot running up in the backyard waking up the neighbors, you know, pulling up things looking for worms. I was just even though it wasn’t the country. I felt like I was in the country so and of course, they didn’t have the technology and I remember waking up the only TV I watched because everyone was still sleeping after going back to bed I stayed up was David and Goliath do remember that? Yes. And so that was kind of like the only TV we kind of had few channels. So most of the time I was outside exploring and falling in love with with the smell of dirt and falling in love with, you know, just the natural things and looking at the clouds and watching them move and finding shapes in the clouds. So it’s just always been a part of me and you know, as a child, we were put on shows in my backyard, I would go up and down the block “hey everybody we’re putting on a show” and I’ve gathered all my friends and we put together the shows and hang up you know sheets and sell tickets and popcorn and into this day I do and I bring that element of theater and art and creativity and nature into the classroom. So I think as teachers, we naturally inorganic, just bring who we are. When we grew up with musicians, then we’re going to bring music into the classroom and introduce that to the children. And so it’s awesome and I’m so grateful to be able to have been teaching in schools that allows you to be who you are. 

LA: Absolutely, absolutely. 

JD: Because it benefits you as a human being. And then it benefits the children because you know, no one wants to just learn rotely, you want to learn experiences and you know, you want to feel what you’re doing

LA: And I feel like already you just dropped a gem like, you know, what does it look like bringing who you are into your practice, right? And staying true to that and, you know? Maybe some we know some of our counterparts may not have that freedom, but it is a blessing to be able to bring your interest and your passions and your talents into your classroom and share those and then watch your students take that and just blossom with it.

JD: And just go and get lost in the garden.

LA: Well Jahidah one of the things that I am so excited about and I’ve read it to my classroom is your new book, The Blended Garden, which is an exceptional book just talking so much about just inclusion, right and how there are so many things in this world that keep trying to keep us as people as nationalities as races so separate and in our little compartments. And your book really highlights just the power and the beauty of what can happen when we all come together. So I wanted to ask you like what was the inspiration of that book? Like what to you like, what did you want the purpose of that book to be?

JD: Well, you know, I spend, when the weather’s warm, I spend a lot of time in my garden. And my garden is very, I just call it wild. I allow everything to grow as it’s supposed to grow. I try not to place things. So I was just out in my garden, and it was I think maybe August when everything is in real full blown, like I have a whole gate filled with poison ivy, and I’ve decided I’m gonna let the ivy be just don’t touch me, I won’t bother you. You don’t bother me. We live happilly in our space. But it’s beautiful and you see it and then the morning glories are everywhere and all the different flowers that I’ve planted over the years and perennials and so I was just back there watching how everything was naturally blending together, like you know, morning rolls around sunflowers and it was just amazing. And I thought you know, this is how things should be with people. Like we should be able to blend together and intertwine and support each other like the morning glories were actually supporting the weaker flowers because their vines are strong. You know also with morning glories, I’ve learned my garden teaches me. So morning glories have been my favorite flower and they teach me if you let them grow wherever they will take over. And it always reminded me of a child that child in your class that you can have three children in your class, but if you have that one child.

LA: That sets the peace for everybody else, yeah.

JD: Right. Like having 50 children in the class, but so the morning glories are like that. So I decided after using years of being frustrated with them, that I was going to put up lines and just see what would happen and at Brooklyn College I was working as a creative arts coordinator and I had children they have this garden so I said let me try it out here so we put up lines and throughout all morning glory seeds in winter came and then spring came in, they started growing, they started going up the vine. They created this beautiful trestle. I did it in my yard as well, but it just taught me that you know, even with the most difficult child that can take over, if you guide it, it can be beautiful. And then I just started taking all kinds I took an old swing chair and and I just and then it became this beautiful arch in the morning glories. Oh, that’s gorgeous. And you know, that with a child you guide them you give them some direction, specific intentional direction. You know, their their weaknesses can be their strengths and my son, he’s diagnosed with ADHD and I learned a lot from him about that. Like, he’s big with his body. And so I decided, you know, physical activity, that’s what we’re going to focus on. I put them in capoeira. I put him in fencing. He’s in basketball. He’s done every physical sport you can think of, because I wanted to guide that so that he can be a beautiful element in the world.

LA: And you were also just honoring who he was.

JD: Exactly. And you have to do it in your garden. And that’s what the book is about. It’s about the gardener wanted to sort, the book is basically about a gardener who wants to sort all the flowers in different places and control the garden. And the flowers protested and we were like, “We want to be friends. And you’re sorting us.” And yeah, it’s honoring, you know, this sunflower, you may want it to face this way. But if the sun is here, it’s going to face this way. No matter what you do. So you have to honor the you know, the internal makeup of that plant, you know, the same way you have to honor the internal makeup of each child and that is a challenge. It can be a challenge.

LA: It is and you know what you said that sort of struck a chord in me it’s sort of that desire that sometimes especially I think when you’re a new teacher, the the desire or that that compelling feeling, you have to need to control what is going on in your classroom at every given moment. But the minute you learn to just let go. That’s like when the real learning starts. I feel like that’s when real growth just as an educator starts like when you like Okay, listen, it might be a little noisy right now there’s learning going on. It might be it might feel like this, but look, you know what they’re playing this child is making friends.

JD: Like controlled chaos. 

LA: Yes, yes. Like like there is so much takeaway. I think that or just impact that is happening in what we may consider like the chaos of our rooms, you know, and I mean, like if you walk into my classroom during choice time it’s pretty loud in there sometimes, you know, and I you know, have fought the urge, you know, and again, like I don’t do it now, but I remember like being a younger teacher, you know, like “Alright friends, I just need you to keep it down.” And sometimes I still am like, you know, “I need you to use your indoor voice.” 

JD: Or even jumping in.

LA: Yes, or even inserting myself in there. Exactly. The learning to sort of back off and allow children to sort of just be themselves.

JD: You know what I love to do? I love I love watching when they fight over toys.

LA: Me too. You know, well I did my thesis on children and conflict. So I spent a year literally observing children having conflict sitting right there, but not interfering I needed to. 

JD: Because the truth is the whole purpose of why we do what we do with these young children is to prepare them to hopefully be better people in life because there’s some really not great people in the world today. And it started out because obviously they didn’t get what they needed when they were small. That just happens. So in the real world, you are going to have to deal with conflict. You’re gonna have to deal with someone taking something from you, hijacking something for you, whatever you call, violating you crossing your boundaries, and you have to be able to learn how to deal with it in a way where someone doesn’t always have to mediate and sometimes there is that tension that pull that pull that so it’s like, it’s not worth it anymore. And then is over.

LA: Exactly. 

JD: As long as no one is getting hurt. You don’t need to step in.

LA: I agree.

JD: That’s the that’s the development. That’s the trust. 

LS: Exactly. And what you’re doing is you’re sort of empowering these children to learn how to advocate for themselves, and then who in turn become adults that then know how to advocate for themselves. So I am a firm believer in in conflict it is so necessary in the classroom is actually beneficial. It’s healthy, like all of that there’s there’s language being learned there, you know, and also there’s that just natural, natural dynamic of like, you know, when one child is sort of asserting themselves and the like you said one child will just let go, that child will let go, so much cognitive development has happened in that moment, that they decided like, you know what, no, it’s not even worth it. Right, exactly.

JD: And as an adult, I mean, every day I’m working toward that.

LA: Right, right, exactly. 

JD: You bumped into me it’s not a big deal, have a good day. 

LA: Like you don’t want to move over and let me sit down. Well, you know, it’s okay, you know, all right. 

JD: You know, and so also to our learning to teach children you know, when they say, “He’s pushing me he’s too close to me”, you know, saying to children, “Well, you know, you can always move away.”

LA: Right? Like you have the power to change the situation.

JD: Why, you physically can just walk away. 

LA: Yeah, exactly. 

JD: This age is all about the social interactions. It’s not, it’s not about, it’s about the cognitive that’s going to always happen, but I’m a big fan of EQ before IQ because I’ve worked with gifted children that have a lot of IQ, but not the EQ. And it’s really interesting to watch how they interact in social circles. And over the years and the decades watching children. I’ve learned that it’s the EQ that matters is that social ability to connect to make friends to have these tug of wars to be able to step away, to take care of your friends to be able to say “I’m angry, I didn’t like that”, I love when they say that. “Don’t push I don’t like that.”

LA: Same, I will send like, you know, a sort of a timid child you know, they’re like, you know, “So and so did this.” And I’m like, “You go back there, and you use your strong voice, and you tell them that you had it first.” 

And just to see, an adult wants you to say that. “Thank you miss Lynnette, I need to go do that for myself.” “No, seriously, you go back there and you tell them that you are sitting there first and you use your strong voice”, like just guiding them like yeah, like say it with a little hum. “Say it is yours.” Right and just to watch them. You know with their shoulders all and new chest all puffed out and just try you know “I had it first” and they look over and I’m like, yes like that. 

JD: You do need that like coach in the corner.

LA: Sometimes yes, sometimes. Sometimes you got to coach. I coach through conflict. Coaching through conflict. 

JD: Coaching through conflict. 

LA: Absolutely. It is. You know, we might have to use that for next season.

JD: That’s a whole that’s a whole documentation piece coaching through conflict.

LA: Exactly. I’ve totally done that though. But I’m so happy to see that like, it’s so refreshing to also see that there’s like educators like myself, who parallel in some of the ways that we navigate the classroom, like letting children sort of tug of war it out, you know, and sometimes I’m like, Okay, let’s see how this is gonna go. You know? Exactly. Or you know, and just again, like encouraging that child who sometimes just, you know, lets people just do whatever or take whatever like no, like, you go back there and you stand up for yourself, advocate for yourself, because then the child then turns into an adult who can advocate for themselves.

JD: That’s what I that’s what I was gonna say. I was gonna say, you know, we grew up where it’s like you have everyone gets a cookie before you get a cookie. You give yourself a cookie last, or go apologize to that person, you know who had it first go, you know, there’s no, like you said self advocacy, just just figuring it out, letting them figure out their own problems, and there’s always someone coming in to micromanage the situation. And, you know, I watch a show over the summer, you know, you know me and my subtitles shows.  And it was all about I won’t get too deep into it, but it was all about this the intro was this little boy who the grandfather was teaching him about a cocoon and the little boy was trying to help the cocoon open and he couldn’t understand why the butterfly died. And that was when the whole show was that you know, you can’t, can’t you have to let the struggle happen in order for the growth to happen. 

LA: I mean, you just said a word there. You have to let the struggle happen in order for the growth to happen. So I mean, I think that is a powerful lesson, I think there are times even as educators that we, you know, sometimes try to not, you know, not force I don’t know that force is the right word, but just try to really sort of over guide and sometimes I think that winds up doing more damage than good, you know, and sometimes it is.

JD: Over talking too sometimes. It’s hard to be silent. It you know, I used to work at the Blue School, and we it was a parent child program. So the parents were in the classroom, that was extremely challenging. So you have the children whose language development is still growing and then you have the parents who they want to make the best experience. So there’s all this excess chatter. So one day I just said, You know what, this week, no one talks except for the children. And I said, classroom, and it was the hardest thing they just walked in like you know, it was great because we got to really see the children sometimes you can’t see someone if you’re always talking, right, you know, you can’t really see. And when I say see, I mean, see who that person is or what their what their, what their idea is. Like, like they maybe won’t even be able to you know, play out their idea because before they even go there, something is said and then it stops the whole thing.

LA: And even in like you know, like a safe dramatic play like “Oh, are you cooking dinner?” like “Are you like”, no, stop, like, stop yourself? Like let them tell you and sometimes don’t even interfere. Just watch and observe and document sort of the process that’s going on and the language development that’s happening. So I think I agree. Like just as teachers. I think that is sort of a learned.

JD: How hard.

LA: It is. It’s a learned behavior. 

JD: I love to talk.

LA: Yeah. You know.

JD: You know when you’re a teacher, if you’re a good seasoned teacher, you’re constantly everyday teaching yourself, you know, you never ever get to the point where like, I’ve done it all. You get bored doing the same thing. And it’s like, maybe I need to change or change the environment. I can change a different age group change a different, you know, philosophy, whatever. But you as a teacher, you always are like, “What can I learn today from from my practice, from who I am and from who they are?” And for me that’s that’s always the thing. It’s just zip, zip it. “Lock it and put it into your pocket Jahidah.”

LA: Exactly. And even I feel like one of the things that you know, I really try to practice is how I talk to children, not talking to them. Like I literally talk to my students in the same tone that I’m talking to you right now. Like I don’t sugar it up. You know, you know, when adults sort of go to that octave that like crazy.

JD: I used to do that a lot when I worked with the babies.

LA: Yeah, because it’s so it’s so it’s just like this natural thing that we do you know, “I know we want to talk like that.” So I really just like no, because if somebody came at me like that, I’d be like, “Oh, my goodness, like this is overwhelming.” 

You’re at 100 Right now I need you at about 14 Exactly. I have not had my coffee yet. So this year in particular, I have this one child who sees just her thing is sort of like just complaining. She’s like, she’s like the she has like a bunch of older siblings. Last one. You know, there’s the attention thing. So you know, every morning I’m like, “Hi, good morning. How was your morning? Do you have a good morning?” And every morning she says the same thing? “No.” And so, and I’m like, I get it and you know so now, I honor her like, I honor just her, you know, her spirit. And so like, I’m just like, “Hey, hey, another bad morning?” and she’s just like, “Yeah”, I was like, “Oh, man, sorry to hear that. Like what was it? Was it like, you know, breakfast was bad?” you know, just trying to like, you know, and I honor just sort of her her natural tendency to sort of want that attention and just communicate what she’s emoting in that moment, and not seek to “Oh, well, everything should be tomorrow will be a better morning.” No. She doesn’t want that she enjoys coming in and being like, “No.” 

JD: I love it. Right. Monday blues, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday

L: Yeah, going back to it’s like honoring who she is and not trying you know guiding her, but not trying to change her and keep put her in this compartment and turn her into this shun shiny, bubbly child. Because right now that’s not who she wants to be.

JD: And imagine that everyone in the world was like that. Imagine that every one in the world was A type personality “Good morning how are you?” we need some of those people just be like “So?” You know, there was a little boy, a long time ago and he was from England. And we were reading a story and the teacher was very animated and all the children you know, and you know, the mom was in the class. I guess the teacher was trying to get an emotive reaction from him. And the mom finally just she got I guess she got sick of it all and she just said he’s smiling on the inside.

L: Like, yes, yes.

JD: This is who he is. Let him be. And I’m gonna be honest with you. There’s something about the masks that I really did love. Because this I mean, we’re gonna I’m gonna go cultural right now.

LA: Wearing a mask? Yeah. Absolutely.

JD: Sometimes, you know, we’re seen as the angry black woman if you’re not smiling. I’m just in thought, so I’m looking “Are you ok?” I’m fine. Yeah, yes, it was just like I couldn’t I didn’t have to. I don’t have to smile if I don’t want to. And I love that little boy because and I love them for saying that because that’s how I feel like I’m smiling on the inside. I’m so happy and joyful. I have joy. But it’s not always look like this. 

LA: Right and sound like.

JD: That place is probably the best thing anyone will ever do for her and it’s healthy. It’s healthy because she can live in her truth. In an environment where she feels safe to live in her truth and I’m gonna go cultural again. Because you know, these if I know before you were talking I don’t want to jump ahead but you’re talking about affinity spaces. And that’s a big part of it is that feeling of I’m safe, to be who I am in my truth and not be judged and not be questioned.

LA: Right? For how I look, or how I don’t look or how I sound or how I don’t sound, all of that. All that matters. And I think the same applies with our students, right? Really allowing, allowing that serious child to stay serious. It’s okay. 

JD: As long as you’re safe just don’t hurt you. Just don’t fall in her head. You know? Wen gotta move then. 

LA: What’s funny, a funny part about this student and I really like I adore her. I sometimes I don’t know if my teachings teaching partners get her, but I get her and I think that’s why it’s also important to have more than one teacher in the classroom because you may not necessarily connect with a child, you know, but then as long as you have, you know, somebody there who can make that connection, right and so she’s kind of like she’s mine. But I’ve I’m working with her on like, like starter sentences to say when she is in one of her moods. So like when she does come in and people are like, “Hey, good morning.” you know, because they’re little, they’re three and four. They can’t read that expression, right? And so I’ve taught her to say things like, “Give me a minute, I just need to get settled in.” Right? I’m like, you can just say, give me a minute. I just need to get settled in. And so she’s like, “Give me a minute. I just need to get settled in.” Right just like you can just say, You know what? And I prompt her, you know, you can like when someone’s like, “Do you want to play with me?”, she’s used to like, “No”, and I’m like, “You know what? You can also say, maybe not right now, but maybe a little later.” so she’s “Not right now. Maybe a little later”, like literally like prompting her to be herself even in the future. Like honoring just sort of who she is.

JD: And you’re giving her this gift of like for in life so she’s doesn’t isolate herself. And giving her tools now to use later. You know, we didn’t get any tools growing up our generation.

LA: No, not not in the way that we teach now. 

JD: We’re like different tools, but these important tools of how to connect based on your individuality. So you’re giving her that that you know, when she gets even older, and you know, you know, girls are very cliquey as they get older. I remember when I worked at a school and the children the girls were like 9,10, 11 and I was like, “You guys are being really mean to each other.” And you know, the thing, it just felt like, wow, she has she has she has tools for the future

LA: She has tools, and she’s learning how to set boundaries for herself. Right? And I think that’s important too. We have to teach our students how to set boundaries and it’s okay, it’s okay to say you know what, give me a minute. Yeah, I just got here give me a minute.

JD: I’m writing crib notes on the side, to use in my life “not now” because you know, as teachers, we overextend ourselves, we’re guilty. We want to help everyone in the world and go out of our way. And I’m here, I’ll do this. And then it’s like, you know, you know, we need to say “No, give me a minute.”

LA: Yeah. Yeah, “I’ll get back to you on that. Let me think about and I’ll get back to you on that. Well, you know what, not right now, but maybe a little later.”

JD: Right. And then we’re happier teachers because you know that saying “Happy wife happy life.” Happy classrooms. Sometimes you have to create boundaries so you can be better for your children. 

LA: Exactly. And speaking of children, I definitely want to talk about something that that you did that was so powerful with your mom and your son, and just sharing Marie just want to hold her name up, who is no longer with us, but sort of in her older age, she was struggling with dementia and so that with Alzheimer’s, and so you wrote a beautiful piece and did a whole sort of introspection into that and I was just wondering if you would share a little bit about that, because I just thought that was so powerful. 

JD: Yeah, well, I found myself coming back home to take care of my mother and take care of my son. So my son Kyle, he was diagnosed ADHD very young. So I was here in the house with ADHD child and a mother with dementia. And I was like, “oh my god”. So I sat in my garden before it was blended. I was like, okay, I can do this. So I had and I just started documenting them. And I started to documenting them and I created this piece I really, I mean, I have the piece but I haven’t done anything with it, I should submit it to a film festival. 

JD: It’s really powerful. Definitely think about it. But yeah, go ahead, continue.

JD: But I called it Development Meets Dementia. So every day I got up and I just watched them in their day, and I just sit back and there was so there were so many things that language development, so mommy couldn’t speak anymore, but she could still sing. Has language hadn’t developed, but he loved to sing because mommy’s a singer. So I watch them come together and sing together and it was just beautiful. So I would document these special moments. There was one moment where I woke up and mommy was in the backyard and she was I guess it was early in the morning she had the hose.

LA: Is that the hose? I love the whole story. 

JD: Yes. Kyle comes out, he was no more than three. And he thinks this is so much fun. And you know, we’re up early. So it’s like maybe 6am the sun’s just coming up. And he starts weting her up and playing and she’s like, laughing and loving. This is a moment of connection, you know? So I spent a year doing that and watching him develop in her Alzheimer’s dementia but what connected them always was music. Yeah, we had these pianos on the floor and so he didn’t have any more language and so they would just dance on the piano and they will make music together. They will look at big books with big pictures because Kyle needed that at that time and mommy needed that and they would connect with the animals and so

LA: I just got the chills Jahidah because I do feel like that is a story that definitely needs to be told and whether it’s a film or a book or your next book. That is such a powerful thing that is such a powerful moment that you documented in both of their lives.

JD: I just have not been able to watch it. It’s just like wonderful moments, but I have not put myself back to that place to, you know, I was so in it when I was doing it and then it was done. But um, yeah, and I think I think at the end of the day, I think the lesson to be learned is that at the end of the day, we just all want to connect, you know, and whatever that connection is.

LA: So important. You are phenomenal. You are so, so phenomenal. And I always feel like in our conversations, I always walk away, like and I’ve learned something or I’ve gotten something and you know, even just from this conversation and I just want to thank you for just sharing all that you did. So if people are interested in getting your book, how should they go about doing that? I know it’s on Kindle, right?

JD: Yeah, so you can go to amazon.com You can download it. I’m still trying to work out how to get it in hardcopy I am checking with publishing companies to get hard copies, but you can get it on Kindle. Put it up on your big screen read it with children read it on your tablet, I mean that’s where we’re at right now.

LA: So going Kindle and download The Blended Garden by Jahidah Diaab. Okay, Kindle and amazon.com and you can download The Blended Garden. And I guess the last question I want to ask you is when you think about like your favorite page in that book or your favorite part of that book, what is it?

JD: I think the protest. The protest when the flowers.

LA: When the flowers are all in protest, like “Why are you keeping us away from each other?” 

JD: Flowers are angry and they began to stand tall, they said to the gardener, “This makes no sense at all.” And they protested because I’ve always been a I don’t know I’ve always been the protester in life. You know, I don’t want to be but it’s just been in my nature. My teachers always say “You should have been a lawyer, make sure she becomes a lawyer.” That and when when the gardener realizes you’re all part of my garden, she’s holding her bouquet of flowers in her hand. Because honestly, you know, my saying that I wrote in another play I did “Anger is the sincerest form of whatever, of change.”

LA: Yes, it is. 

JD: You have to be angry, in order for something to change. And for me in my life, if I’m not angry, then something’s not changing. And you don’t have to hurt anyone to be angry. 

LA: It is it is an amazing catalyst for change. Anger it is. Being angry at something, being frustrated with something, it makes you want to move things around, do things differently, you know, so I agree. I agree. And so you know, 

JD: And I’m not an angry woman.

LA: No, we are not angry people, but just the whole idea of anger.

JD: It’s Healthy. 

LA: Righteous anger absolutely, indignation you know, like injustice like it you know, that’s that’s how you know laws that you know have been unjust got changed because people got angry, and then made those changes and marched or did or protested and moved. Were vocal about you know what they wanted to see happen. That’s how it got done. So yeah, I am I too am a firm believer that anger is a powerful catalyst for change. Well, Jahidah it has been amazing talking to you. And I hope that you will come back next season for another interview. When I feel like even so maybe maybe our next interview is coaching through conflict because that’s that’s good. Awesome, right. 

JD: I will tell you really quick, maybe I would love to come back on and talk to you about I’m doing this I’m following this thread of the beauty of brown it’s just all materials brown and engaging in developing children and and I’ve been documenting it and sharing in I would love to at some maybe another time, but I just think it’s so important for young children who are not brown to love the color brown without thinking about race or color. And so that’s where that’s what I’m I’m in right now. In my classroom.

LA: Oh my gosh, that sounds powerful. So yeah, I would, I would love I’ll take you up on that. Thank you do Jahidah and for all of you listening, please go to amazon.com and you can download The Blended Garden on Kindle. Thank you to Jahidah. 

JD: Love you girl.

LA: Love you too.