Dassain---an occasion to remember family and parents

Dassain^__an occasion to remember family and parents

The annual festival which the Hindu celebrates all over the world with grand celebration has an important significance. Dassain, not only is a time of celebration but also a time of family reunion— siblings who have been far away from each other; sons and daughters who are  hills apart  from their parents; grandsons and grand daughters who have not met with their grandma and grandpa^__ this is the time, distance is nullified!

Dassain is an auspicious occasion, when the crack in family relationship is joined; it is the time when distance of time and space is once again made to disappear. Dassain is the time when you know how lucky you are to have family and parents. “Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, and call it a family. Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one”, writes Jane Howard.

Often times, we forget that we owe a lot to our family, being lost in some other materialistic world. There happens to be no time we want to think we belong to a beautiful family where our childhood is rooted. Desmond Tutu says, “You don’t choose your family. They are God’s gift to you, as you are to them”. We don’t have time for the members of family we have been grown up with. Other times, we are so busy treading our own journey; we are so focused in sewing our own dreams and seeking our own livelihood, yet Dassain is a time we keep aside these selfish motives. Albert Einstein says, “Rejoice with your family in the beautiful land of life!” Our life is a land where the seed of happiness is already existent and unless we dedicate ourselves in nurturing it, we can never have it sprout. Dassain is the time we can rejoice with family.

In the work of Paul Pearshell, it says, “Our most basic instinct is not for survival but for family. Most of us would give our own life for the survival of a family member, yet we lead our daily life too often as if we take our family for granted. Therefore, Dassain is the time we get to know that, after all we need our family. “Having a place to go — is a home. Having someone to love — is a family. Having both — is a blessing, supplements Donna Hedges.

For those of us who are away from a native land, Dassain is the time we get to step once again on it and feel blessed. Our home and family are not just something we must have possessed; they are the ones our entire life moves with. What Thomas Jefferson states substantiate further by saying. “The happiest moments of my life have been the few which I have passed at home in the bosom of my family”. Gail Lumet Buckley also says “Family faces are magic mirrors. Looking at people who belong to us, we see the past, present, and future. Dassain remind us about the reality of life.

For those of us who been away from parents, Dassain is the time we understand again how great parents have been in our lives. “My heroes are and were my parents. I can’t see having anyone else as my heroes” says Michael Jordan. Yes, the people who keep saving us from unseen, unheard and unprecedented disasters are parents. Chuck Palahniuk writes “First your parents, they give you your life, but then they try to give you their life”.   

                                                                                   They keep sacrificing for us, yet we 

don’t always want to know it. Most of the time, we tend to ignore the fact that our father who, sometimes in life, carried us on his shoulder; who held our hands and taught us to walk and taught us even if we fall, he would stretch his hands to help us get up. Our mother who gave us a confidence that, no matter who hated our looks, she would always love us unconditionally--  a fact that we often forget with hustle and bustle of our lives. Despite her tiredness after a heavy toil in the scorching sun (for many of us whose back ground is rural life), she never failed to comfort us. Therefore, Dassain is such occasion we shall revive the dead feeling and realize that our parents have given entire life to us. What we are now as a man and woman, it is our parents who sacrificed their entirety in having us so.

May this Dassain, open up the eyes of many people who have been blind towards their family and parents presence. May a sentimental blossom bloom at the heart of those broken families. May the broken thread of relationship tie reuniting knots of love and forgiveness. HAPPY DASSAIN TO ALL!

Acknowledgement:Both images are extracted from internet.