"the silver sound of bridal bells..."

There are a very few stories in the world where the sequel is as good as or better than the first one. Louisa May Alcott's "Good wives" definitely is among them. Some parts become more relevant to a girl as she grows up and faces the bitter-sweet things of life, heartaches being numero uno!!! "In the garret", a poem written by Jo in "Good Wives" is one of my favourite poems and I am found to quote that in many places. Mostly I quote Jo's part...but now something is different, I am found to quote Amy's part..."Upon the last lid's polished field, legend now both fair and true. A gallant knight bears on his shield-- 'Amy' in letters gold and blue." I love this...someone up north is bearing on his shield my name too :-)
In "Rebecca", the girl once talked about bottling up memories...if only we could bottle the good times up and then take a look or sniff at them later...I like the idea...I would have cherished this time of my life forever.
Getting married is one of the most important phases of every human's life, but for a Bengali girl it is of IMMENSE importance. I was never a sterotypical bengali girl, and these couple of years of grad-school in USA have taken away the remnants but deep down somewhere I am so very bengali and so proud of being a bengali girl too. In early days, the girls used to leave their home and go to the family of someone whom they never had met before. In my case it's ofcourse not the same, and I left home for grad school before I planned to get married, so I really dont have any reason to feel worried, but I AM worried. there are feelings for which we dont know the reason, and this is one of them.
Dont think I am just feeling worried, I am feeling 90% happy :-) It is actually so unbelievable that I am getting married...!!! I, Ria, the girl who used to run down the staircases, jumping 2 steps at a time with pigtails flying, is getting MARRIED!!! INCREDIBLE!!! I seriously cannot picturize myself in a grown-up world, talking to my in-laws...oh no!!!! Moreover, there will be a guy with me all day...there will be shaving cream and razor in the bathroom,"not-so-good-looking" shoes all around, shirts and heavy jeans in the laundry, smells of guys perfume in the room!! I will have to visit the men's section of stores to find one particular grey or blue shirt...someone will be enthusiastically talking about cars and watches and spend sleepless nights watching football...strange life!!! Great change for a girl's life...but this is making me happy, because this guy is the one I love, this guy is my Arnab!!!

I have many things to learn now. Nowadays, though we say that career is more important to family, (I was one of the leading feminists in high school and college) I personally feel now, that family is more important (provided you have a loving and caring husband)!!! There was a reason God made me a woman, and I can feel that now. The love, the care I feel in myself when I think about Arnab, the way I want to depend on him...these all make me feel so happy and proud. I am having a wonderful feeling which I cannot articulate. Perhaps it is one of the best feelings a girl can experience as she blossoms into a woman. When she feels the love of the man she loves...when she hears "the silver sound of bridal bells in the falling summer rain".