2014: A happening year

“Happy New Year" is on everybody's lips as the clock strikes 12 midnight, whether it's to the person next to you or a dear one half way around the world. We spend the eve of the New Year with family and friends; wishing each other good.  
As the previous year closes its chapter we turn the leaves backwards and look at the meaningful events we have crossed.
Indeed for me, the year 2014 has been very eventful. I stepped into a new decade. So did my life partner.
On the first day of the year my daughter went into wedlock and sometime down the year my son resolved to turn a new page in his life. I presume I have not witnessed so many milestones in a year. I am blessed.
Many of these happenings were my resolutions of the year before.
Strange isn't it? That the Christian year marks the time for us. We celebrate the Bangla New Year in the morning of Pohela Boishakh, we observe the Islamic year when we fast in the month of Ramadan, or observe Shab e Barat. But when the clock strikes twelve on the eve of Christian New Year, we feel we have marked a time spent in our lives. I personally have no issues. Somewhere we have to have a marker. Just as we have the watch that ticks away telling us time is going past the Christian New Year is another timer in our lives.
Coming back to the first day of 2014; I had my brother and sister visiting us. They were staying at our place. My mother was in another township at Ramna thana in Eskaton Garden. My daughter and her "now" husband decided that the first day of the year was the best day to get married, so at 11 pm, we have to organize the Kazi, get my mother from Eskaton Garden to Banani, we had to organize the "ukeel baba" and the shakkhi (witnesses) from both sides. Thankfully, we had the whole family as house guests. So the marriage was solemnized. We served the people present in the occasion with "mishti" and not with the usual "khorma" (dried dates).
It still amazes me, as the year rolled by, that my daughter taught me so much. She has done some amazing things. She planned her own wedding celebrations which happened this December along with her husband and her amazing friends.
Observing one of her friend's marriages, she had commented that mothers forget it's NOT their marriage but that of their daughter or son. As through the year, the preparations went on, I kept reminding myself that it is my daughter's marriage!! A lot of burden was taken off from my shoulders. It was planned according to her wishes and so she and her WONDERFUL friends/partners had to do it ALL.
As the year ends, I am thankful to God that I have raised two modern children to adults. Those who have taken lives into their hands and are carving out a life THEY want.
God Bless!!

The writer is Actor, Director, & Activist