Mai Qabuul Kiyah

"Mai Qabuul Kiyah"

(May 24, 2022)

Thirty years ago today, I said these words in front of over a thousand people, and one special person. With that phrase- butchered by my poor Urdu pronunciation- I agreed to marry Sameena. Those words were a promise- to her, to her parents and my parents, to the family we would start, and the thousands of guests- that I took that commitment seriously. I meant every word I said that night. That night started a wonderful journey with a good woman. We had fun and we had issues. We started fights but we made up. We were committed. Six years later we welcomed our first daughter and under four years later, our second. From that first night, we had eventually created a family.

Tonight, thirty years later, I will not be with her. Those fights that we would earlier have finished and moved past, now would end by just getting buried. They would fester and grow into suffocating weeds of resentment and misery (during our courtship, I had frequently alluded to our relationship as a blooming garden). I would hide in those thickets and then sneak out to find escape. The bramble of lies would stick to our relationship and eventually kill the flower of the family we had created. We separated 21 years after our marriage and then divorced 26 years after that Memorial day weekend wedding.

As I've described in other stories, that period immediately after was dark, lonely, and painful. I lived lonely and estranged from nearly every human being outside of work, where I had not shared my shameful existence. I have lived many of those years in shame, guilt, and penury- being punished and punishing myself. I have ended up living with my mother, who only wonders "what's wrong with you"? I have been without hope of ever living out dreams.

However, out of the overgrowth, green shoots of hope have existed and started to grow. Fertilized with music, tended by friends, and pruned through my own self-forgiveness these shoots have taken root. Through self-forgiveness, I have created a new relationship with Sameena and our two daughters. They know that I have not walked away from the garden and that they will be supported and protected. During the pandemic, Sameena and I worked together as parents to provide a beautiful wedding for our older daughter. We are preparing our younger daughter for her future as an aspiring architect. Two days ago, Sameena and our younger daughter ate dinner at my house, with thoughts about future vacations and plans. And actually, this very evening, I am enjoying a home-cooked dinner with our older daughter and her husband. This would not have been the likely happening just a few years earlier.

Out of this self-forgiveness, I have created a new garden of possibility. The possibility of being self-assured and self-valued. These possibilities have in turn created a shelter that has given me a chance to create a new happiness. Today, I will sign a new contract with my employer that reflects my value and estimation and the relationships I have created. One of the killing rackets I had with my marriage was to not ask for what I wanted and then being upset and bitter. With my contract, I have determined what I wanted and worked to achieve it, and have been rewarded by getting what I have requested. Therefore, I will be continuing a relationship instead of running away. And with that, I have a feeling of starting life anew while keeping the best of the existing benefits. I will be able to move out and start a new home. I will be independent yet connected. I will be able to create and act upon my dreams.

Thirty years since I said "Mai Qabuul Kiyah", I'm saying it again, to myself and the communities around me. I accept my life as it is now and with the promises it holds. I accept creating happiness out of possibility. I accept the joy of planting hope. I accept the position of a gardener tending to dreams from which a new reality will sprout.