I vividly remember the moment I stepped out of the room draped in a sequined crimson saree – the quintessential Indian bride. My relatives and friends showered me with compliments, praising my makeup and captivating aesthetics. However, my bleary-eyed father was nowhere in sight as he did not want to let his emotions get the better of him.
We still managed to come face-to-face before the wedding ceremonies began and in that moment we felt ourselves being sucked into a whirlpool of memories. With the air thick with our reined in emotions, an uncomfortable silence enveloped us as we took opposite paths and threw furtive glances at each other as we passed.
Within no time, the phere (perambulation around the sacred fire pit) were complete and it was time for me to leave for my husband’s home. Covering the distance from the wedding hall to the decorated car awaiting us outside was perhaps the longest, toughest, and emotionally exhausting journey. Once I was seated in the back seat of the car, all relatives took turns to bid me adieu, but the startling absence of the most important person, raised many a brow, until somebody spotted his looming figure. The sight of him calmed down the perplexed wedding party, but brought a lump to my throat.
My heavily built father, who had always had an aura of toughness about him, was misty-eyed and his otherwise confident gait was missing as he wobbled forth to bid farewell to his beloved daughter, for whom he had played the role of both mother and father. A kaleidoscope of memories flashed through my head as I remembered my childhood and teenage years spent in his mollycoddling protection, how often my father went overboard to fulfil my needs and desires, whether trivial or urgent, and his many sacrifices for the sake of his three children.
{{/usCountry}}My heavily built father, who had always had an aura of toughness about him, was misty-eyed and his otherwise confident gait was missing as he wobbled forth to bid farewell to his beloved daughter, for whom he had played the role of both mother and father. A kaleidoscope of memories flashed through my head as I remembered my childhood and teenage years spent in his mollycoddling protection, how often my father went overboard to fulfil my needs and desires, whether trivial or urgent, and his many sacrifices for the sake of his three children.
{{/usCountry}}The moment my father hugged me is still fresh in my mind. He did not say anything, gave me a swift hug and then recoiled, unwilling to let the dam of emotions burst. Suddenly, he crouched down again and all formal decorum was forgotten as he broke down. Seeing unexpected and unprecedented tears course down his cheeks, I too started weeping copiously. Our embrace, which perhaps just lasted a minute, spoke volumes of what we meant to each other.
A few months later, when I visited my father, wearing bangles, sporting vermillion and mangalsutra, we all assembled in front of the LED screen to watch the wedding video. We thoroughly enjoyed it until the moment of departure when everybody had tears in their eyes and my father left the room as the song, “Babul ka ghar chodd ke beti piya ke ghar chali, yeh kaisi ghadi aayi hai, milan hai judai hai” played in the background.
The loud celebratory claps and cheers from the audience, marking the end of the video broke the spell, but by the time a deluge of tears had already stained my cheeks, without me realising it!
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( The writer is a Kharar-based freelance contributor)