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How’s your year? Are you ready for 2014? What’s most the exciting thing you’ve ever done?

Were there heartbreaks, breakdown, breakthrough?

Personally – 2013 has been the most memorable life-changing year for me – I got married.

It was unlike any other serious commitments or risky adventures in my life.

It was my first marriage, I became a wife in mid-life.

As if that wasn’t enough, the speed of our romance surprised all our friends and family. We met in the Spring, got engaged in the Summer, got married in the Fall – it all happened this year. Why so fast? My response was – why wait? I’ve been waiting all my life, but perhaps looking for love in all the wrong places.

Mr. Right came along at a time and place where I wasn’t looking. But I instantly noted something striking when we first met – I saw hearts in his eyes, and question marks on his mind. He is not only sweet and smart, compassionate and generous, but also quirky, funny, giggly – perpetually curious about new and different ideas, people and places.

Many longtime friends in America and my family in Hong Kong expressed a sign of relief.  Their long wait is over! “Mable’s married – finally! ” screamed a close friend. Seriously, they never thought they’d see this day. One former TV colleague openly predicted many years ago that I would never get married. Why not? Well, they see me as too career-focused, too independent, too picky.  All that is true – partially. What they don’t see is the underlying layers of fears about marriage – which I’d blogged about in “Freedom in Love” (Nov 8th 2013)

In “Freedom in Love” , I talked about the first man who loved me so much that he’d freed me to pursue my dream – my father. Now in his eighties, he continues to trust my judgment about my life, and my love. When I took my husband Ken to meet him in Hong Kong last month, I was frankly, a little concerned about his reaction.

In my blog “Dating American Boys” (July 18th, 2012) my dad had tried to make me promise that I would not date American boys – just before I left for Detroit to attend high school. I’d managed to change his mind about what I’d called “unreasonable demand”, but convinced him that marrying an American was not on my mind. I was honest; I was just sixteen at the time.

But since then, I had dated a number of western and Chinese guys before finally saying “yes” to an American man who’d devoted thirty years of his life to a woman he loved before losing her to a long illness several years ago. Months before their first face-to-face meeting in November, I had called my dad numerous times, wrote him letters with cards and photos describing what kind of a man Ken is, and how I felt about him. But my father doesn’t remember a thing – he has dementia. Every time I talked to him about Ken, it’s news to him.

On the day they met for the first time, daddy looked lost.

He didn’t speak to Ken, just smiling every time Ken tried to talk with him, in English. My dad understands English and can speak a little. He speaks in English whenever he needs to communicate with our Filipino housekeeper. But here’s the thing – daddy didn’t talk back to Ken. He was nodding, looking away and down, but never connecting with me or Ken. That was the biggest heartbreak of the year. What was daddy thinking? He showed little emotion during the initial meeting, and initiated no eye-contact. But I kept trying. Everyone in my family kept trying to strike conversation after conversation – in English, in Chinese.  Over the course of the afternoon into the evening, daddy began to loosen up.  After seeing my brother and sister congratulating us, and cracking jokes over our scrumptious dinner, daddy finally broke out laughing with everyone else when dessert came.

Perhaps my father couldn’t articulate his thoughts and feelings, but he is still present. He may not have given me the expression or emotion I was looking for at the very moment I wanted it, but he is alive and well. He continues to live as a loyal man to my mother who passed away more than fifteen years ago.  His loyalty, grace and goodness has never failed to pick me up whenever I thought of him.  My dad has not endured much hardship or adversities in his life except for the sudden loss of his love, the sudden death of our mother. My mom died of a heart attack one evening at the prime of her life. Her untimely death had caused me, and everyone in the family a near-emotional breakdown, expressing shock and sorrow beyond words. For me – there’s an added sense of guilt and remorse for being so far away, being the only one in America when the rest of my family was by her bedside. However, I finally received a breakthrough weeks after I got married; I dreamed of my mother looking years younger than the year she died. She smiled with me.

Now in my newly married life, I feel not only renewed with a loving caring husband, but also recharged with a fresh perspective on how I want to live, work and contribute to society.

In 2014, I will reset my priorities spending more time with family while re-launching my career fine-tuning my focus on work related to education and the next generation. I don’t have the crystal ball or a blue print yet for the next step. But I’m deeply grateful that I already have a very good year, and that’s good enough for me.

Happy 2014!