The Wedding Lessons I Wish I Knew

I want this blog to become something my child can keep when I am no longer here, a small record of choices I made and lessons I carried. Some of those lessons came from the way I planned my own engagement party and wedding reception in 2017. They were meaningful days, but I made several decisions that I hope my daughter will not repeat.

At my engagement party, I did not hire a professional makeup artist or hairstylist. I wore a simple kebaya, which was fine, because simplicity can be beautiful. The problem was not the kebaya. It was the lack of care in how I prepared myself. A professional touch helped me feel more polished and confident.

There was also the matter of the gift. Traditionally, the future husband gives a meaningful gift, often a gold ring. In my case, I ended up buying my own necklace, a titanium piece with a fragile stone that broke not long after. It is no longer with me. I want my daughter to know that a symbolic gift is not about price. It is about intention and respect, not just 'yang penting ada'.

My wedding reception itself still feels warm in my memory. It was simple, intimate, and graceful. The challenge was that I planned everything on my own. As a result, my cousin had to keep asking questions during the event, and I found myself dividing my attention between being a bride and being an organizer. Since my daughter is also an only child, just like me, I suggest hiring a wedding organizer. It allows you to be present, to enjoy the moment fully, and to leave the logistics in capable hands.

These are small lessons, but they shaped the way I think about preparation, intention, and care. I write them here so she can learn from them, or at least understand why her mother made the choices she did.

This lesson also carries into choosing a partner. Do not settle for the bare minimum or for someone who only happens to be there. Choose someone who does not make you feel as if everything must begin from zero. Begin at five or even ten, so you have room to grow and build a fuller life.

The Two Sides

Cancer has become a familiar topic in my life these days because many friends have lost relatives to it.

My boss happened to recommend an article by Tatiana Schlossberg, the granddaughter of John F. Kennedy, in The New Yorker. In that piece, she describes discovering she had cancer shortly after giving birth to her second child. Nurses noticed unusually high white blood cell counts. She brushed it off at first because she felt strong and lived a healthy life. She exercised often. Nothing seemed wrong. Yet the tests showed acute myeloid leukemia, tied to a rare mutation called Inversion 3.

She wrote about the treatments she underwent, including a bone marrow transplant, and how the disease kept returning. She wrote about missing time with her children, especially her newborn. She lost nearly half of her baby’s first year. 

After reading her story, I listened to a conversation with Atul Gawande, a surgeon who also writes. In his early career, he struggled with the discomfort of being imperfect, especially during his first operations. Later, he learned to accept mistakes and trust his ability to respond to them. But when he entered cancer care, he faced a different kind of difficulty. He said that in cancer practice, you often meet patients you simply cannot fix. He admitted he did not yet know what it meant to be good at caring for people whose problems had no cure.

I cried when I read Schlossberg’s story. As a mother, I worry about the possibility of serious illness, whether in myself or in my daughter, and the thought of being apart by death is frightening. Like Schlossberg, I want to enjoy every single moment with my child, because none of us knows how long we get to hold those moments.

Back to the writing, I feel that these two perspectives are a full circle. On one side, a patient who is frightened, frustrated, and grieving the time she may lose. On the other, a doctor who carries the weight of knowing his skills cannot save everyone, yet still tries to make each person’s remaining time meaningful.

Gawande also explained that people have goals beyond simply living longer. Those goals differ from one person to another, and they change over time. The only reliable way to understand them is to ask. But doctors do not ask often enough. When care does not match a patient’s priorities, suffering grows.

I do not have a conclusion after reading and listening to all this. It is simply eye-opening to see the fears, limits, and dilemmas from both sides. It made me feel for the patient’s sadness, but also recognize the strain on the people trying to help.

On Finding a Place to Belong

Whenever my collague comes to the office, I always find myself asking what she is reading. The last time we met, she was still making her way through Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose. I told her I had just finished Dawuk by Mahfud Ikhwan, a novel I enjoyed deeply.

“It feels so Indonesian,” I said. “There are stories of warriors, and the language is rich. I like books that carry cultural weight. I also enjoy immigrant stories, like the ones written by Amy Tan or Jhumpa Lahiri.”

“Why is that? Do you feel like an immigrant yourself?” Michelle asked.

Her question surprised me. No one had ever asked me that before, and it made me stop and think: why am I so drawn to immigrant stories?

The theme about immigrant is far from my own life. I was born and raised in Indonesia, and the farthest I have ever moved is from Bandung to Tangerang. Yet the books of Amy Tan and Jhumpa Lahiri have become windows into worlds I do not know. Through them, I learn about Chinese and Indian traditions, about life in America, and about the way migration reshapes families.

In her essay Mother Tongue, Tan describes how her mother, who spoke broken English, was often dismissed and not taken seriously. For serious matters, like dealing with a stockbroker, she had to rely on Tan to speak for her. 

In Fish Cheeks, Tan recalls the embarrassment she felt when her mother served Chinese food to American guests on Christmas. Her mother even placed fish cheeks on Amy’s plate, and after the meal her father burped loudly, a Chinese custom meant to show satisfaction. Their guest looked down at his plate, his face red with unease.

I am drawn to these stories because they reveal what it means to hold on to one’s identity while also trying to be accepted in a new place. Jhumpa Lahiri explores this tension further in her novel The Namesake, where a child of immigrants struggles with identity in America—never fully Indian, never fully American.

Even though I have never crossed a border, the emotions in these stories feel close. Most people, I think, experience them in their own way: the awkwardness of being different, the effort of fitting in, and the search for a place where we truly belong.

Perhaps that is why immigrant stories speak so strongly to me. They remind me that identity is never fixed. It shifts with place, with people, and with time. And in that sense, maybe we are all migrants—moving through different stages of life, carrying pieces of ourselves, and learning how to belong wherever we are.

The Boredom

 

In the past few months, I have felt a steady boredom settling in at the office. The pace of my job has slowed, and most of my focus has shifted to internal projects. Day after day, I am handling the same platform, the same topics, the same conversations. Nothing is exactly wrong, yet nothing feels alive.

The first place where this monotony made itself known was in my creativity. As someone whose work depends on producing content, fresh ideas are my currency. But lately, it has become harder to find them. I still push myself to read or listen to podcasts, trying to get an inspiration. Still, forcing ideas feels different from discovering them.

Mondays have become heavy. It is not that I hate my job, but I know what is waiting for me at the office: another week of sameness. That realization has started to color my thoughts. I find myself looking inward too often, measuring what I have not yet achieved and comparing it to what others seem to have already reached.

Trying to find a solution ...

I began to think that perhaps the cure lies in seeking new challenges. Maybe I should ask my boss to give me a different role, something that pulls me outside the building, like reporting in the field, talking to people, learning new stories. I have realized how little space I have outside of work. After office hours, I go straight home. My house is far, and I want to keep time for my daughter. That leaves me with few activities beyond the routine.

I also have tried to return to what I love. Working out gives me a sense of release, even if for an hour, and it reminds me that movement itself can lift a heavy mind. I have also tried to shift my perspective. Sometimes, boredom signals that life is stable. Perhaps stability is not something to resent but to accept with gratitude.

Still, I am learning how to hold both truths: that boredom can feel suffocating, and that it can also remind me I am safe. The challenge now is to use that stability as a base to build something more meaningful—whether by seeking new tasks, creating space for passion outside of work, or simply learning how to sit with quiet until inspiration returns.

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Photo by Randy Tarampi on Unsplash

The Weight of Simple Kindness

Over the past few months, I’ve been making regular trips to the hospital because my mother has a heart condition. Later, we found out she also has diabetes. So, every month I take her to see both a cardiologist and an internist. 

Every time I prepare to accompany her, whether to the community clinic or the hospital, I steel myself. There are always moments of unpleasantness: a doctor at the clinic who responds curtly to questions about referral letters, a hospital clerk who never looks up from the monitor, a tone of voice that sounds hurried or dismissive.

And yet, there are also days when we meet someone different. A doctor who greets us with warmth, a nurse who takes the time to explain, a staff member who treats us as people instead of numbers. In those moments, I feel a lump rise in my throat. I want to say, “Thank you for being kind to me. I needed that more than you know.

I recognize the same feeling in another part of my life: the daily commute to work by train. The scene is crowded and chaotic—voices raised, elbows thrown, people pushing and cursing just to force themselves through the doors. Some plant themselves at the entrance, refusing to make way for others.

But once in a while, someone offers a seat, or reaches up to help place my bag in the overhead rack. These gestures stand out so sharply against the noise and impatience around them. The contrast makes the kindness shine brighter than it otherwise would.

And so I keep asking myself: why does kindness move me so deeply? Why does it feel extraordinary when it should be ordinary? Isn’t kindness supposed to be the baseline in how we live with one another?

I once came across an explanation. Chuck Swindoll, an author and preacher, suggested that kindness is rare because it requires extra time, and most of us are always in a hurry. That struck me as true. Life today feels like a race. We are pushed to think of ourselves first. Competition speaks louder than compassion.

Kindness, on the other hand, slows us down. It asks us to imagine the world from another person’s point of view. It asks us to set aside our own concerns, however briefly, and step into someone else’s need. And since selfishness comes so naturally to us, kindness never arrives easily.

Perhaps that is why I am surprised whenever someone chooses it. Because in that moment, they have given me more than a seat or a hand with my bag. They have given me their time, their energy, their presence.

These small acts can make my day. I know I cannot expect them from everyone. But perhaps that is not the point. Perhaps the point is that I can choose to be the one who carries it forward, so that kindness does not end with me, and make someone else’s day a little lighter.

I Value Conversations

If you’ve met me in person but don’t know me that well, you might think I’m not the type who enjoys talking to people. But that’s not true. I actually love hearing people’s stories like what they do every day, their opinions on certain things, their work, even little details about their life. For me, that’s how friendships start, and sometimes those stories give me new insights or inspiration.

I’m usually the one asking questions. I don’t talk much about myself unless someone asks. It’s kind of my way of checking if they’re actually interested in getting to know me too.

Of course, not every attempt goes well. Recently I tried to start conversations with some new people in my neighborhood and at school. I asked about their jobs, what industries they’re in, but they didn’t really ask me anything back. 

That’s when I knew they weren’t interested, and honestly, I didn’t feel like pushing it either. I want to make friends with people who value me, not with those who don’t care to connect.

But that’s just how it is with people, right? You can’t expect everyone to respond the way you want. Sometimes you click, sometimes you don’t. And that’s okay. 😊

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Photo by Priscilla Du Preez 🇨🇦 on Unsplash

What Lingers

A few weeks ago, a friend interviewed me about what happens to our online data after we pass away. In that article, I shared that I sometimes visit a late friend’s Facebook account whenever I miss her. Her final days are still there: messages from her at the hospital bed, her moments of hope, and her quiet sorrow that her husband had to put his life on hold to stay by her side through it all.

She was my husband's friend, and we weren’t that close. But we met a few times, and I could tell she was warm and easygoing. I found myself liking her more each time we crossed paths.

It’s not just her page I visit. Sometimes I find myself scrolling through other accounts too, including one belonging to a friend I used to write with. I see snapshots of his home renovations, memories from when he had just bought the house. He was so proud of it. I’d been there a few times. In fact, years ago I helped get that house featured in a magazine by introducing him to a reporter.

I still remember what he said to me the day he showed it off: “This house may be far from the city center, but let’s see ... maybe your next house will be even further out.”

He said many hurtful things to me: about my appearance, about my family. I won’t go into detail because in Islam, we are encouraged to remember the good of those who have passed, not to speak ill of them after they’re gone.

Still, some of his words stay with me. They echo from time to time, leaving behind something I can’t quite name. Not rage, but something quieter. Something heavier. Resentment, maybe. It lingers in the background, like a song I can’t turn off.

But I don’t want that resentment to disturb whatever peace he may have found. And I don’t want it to keep weighing me down either.

So I’m learning to let go. Not because he asked for forgiveness, or even deserved it, but because I need to be free.

And maybe that brings me back to the first question — about our online presence, and what remains of us when we're gone. I don’t want people to hold a grudge against me either, or feel anger when they scroll past a photo of me after I’m no longer here. So if I’ve ever hurt you (knowingly or not), I hope you’ll forgive me.

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Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash