Setareh Sabety

It is Sat. morning June 20th my daughter's birthday. Fifteen years ago I gave birth to her hoping that someday she would live in a free Iran.

Today there is a protest March planned in Tehran despite the warnings of crackdown of that most evil of evil 'leaders': Khamenei.

I woke up early, like I have every day this past week, because my heart beats for the struggle in Iran. Today especially my heart, like that of many other compatriots' and well wishers, beats for Iran, like it has not in so many years.

Ever since the crackdown on women protesters almost thirty years ago, in the aftermath of the Revolution of '79 in Iran, when they forced Hejab on us and with that single gesture alienated so many of us from what became a completely Islamic revolution, I have not felt so attached, so connected to my people.

The events of the past week, the youtubed courage that we have witnessed has awakened us again this time more than ever. I, for one, have fallen in love all over again with Iran and like a lover obsessed with her be loved I eat, drink, sleep and wake up to the thought of my beloved Iran and her noble people. I, who had lost hope, who had lived in Iran again recently and seen a crass and materialistic side of the people that left me cold, have fallen madly in love again with a people who seem to have shed all their selfish street savvy and cunning, all their bazaari materialism, to sacrifice life and limb for freedom, for the right to have a voice.

Images cross my mind like a flikr slide show to the sound of screaming mothers. I see a young man shot in the face, another being beaten to a pulp by basiji thugs, a group of young Kurds hanging from nooses in the middle of a main street. I see a girl kicking a security policeman, kids throwing rocks at gunmen aiming at them, a perfect manicured hand of a young woman holding a rock ready to throw. I see a sea of people, who share my hopes and fears for Iran, walking in their silence on the wide avenues and squares of my beloved, polluted, and over populated Tehran. I see old women in chadors and young women with a new found courage chanting the wishes of my heart even when to do so may mean arrest, beating and death.

And I pray, even though an atheist, I pray that today this all important day, courage and justice is triumphant and that there will be no blood shed. I pray that no mother has to hear bad news, no woman is martyred and no young man beaten or arrested. I pray that these people whom I love, who are risking their lives with incredible courage for me and you, are not harmed and that their silent, persistent message of the basic need for freedom and democracy wins the day.

I am going to go and buy the cake for my daughter's surprise party organized by her friends who have little clue about Iran, in this town so far from my beloved Tehran and Mashad, shaking inside hoping, praying, that this day will be remembered as the day Iranian joined Iranian in one big push for what every nation should possess a simple respect for civic and human rights! My heart beats to the tune of fear and hope, fear and hope for the triumph of this movement. This freedom for my country,this the greatest wish I have ever harbored!