Selorm Deku

  The convergence of erstwhile divergent unrelated emotions, minds, purposes and desires for a cause greater than what the individual mind, emotion, desire and purpose dream is what some see as love. To some, it begins at the point at where a fragile glass-like heart perceives a personality worth treasuring. That supposes the losing of the mind before the birth of it which I do not accept. The patriotic and socially inclined see it as self-denial for one’s polity and forfeiture of some of one person’s joy to bring others also upward to an appreciable level of comfort and well-being. Love means much and the explanations of it are as many as the unbroken hearts the world is still managing to deal with. IT HAS BEEN DEFINED AND REDEFINED . Another group of people against whom I am quite biased in my judgment toward see love in a simplistic sense of a momentary sexual affair. “Show me your love” means nothing less or more to these group of people than t...

It was a practice in remote Ghana in the not too distant past when older family members travel to the city to buy footwear for the younger family members, they would measure the feet of the prospective shoe owner with broom sticks. The way it works is that because most of the people could not tell the sizes of footwear that the individual uses, they would break a locally made broomstick (manufactured from palm fronds or coconut stalks) and align it by the feet and break just enough to match the length of the broom stick with that of the shoe owners. Even in cases when the older ones want to surprise the younger ones which normally occurs during festivities, this special measurement is done when the kids are asleep.  

This story is in memory of the late Mr Bernard K. Deku . He was a man with little formal education and a lot of knowledge, very strong and very soft when dealing with his brethren. Like all men though, he wasn't flawless. Selikem was  seven years before he got into primary one. Even though by national requirements he was late in school, regionally his time was very early. Unlike most of the people in the village where he lived, he had to walk daily to the next village which was about 4 kilometers in order to attend school unless he got the blessing of a passing car. He had a brown short, a "blue-bird" slipper a little bigger than him and a red T-shirt with black stripes. Seli as he was known was a happy boy who never thought he needed anything until his school decided that all pupils must wear a certain uniformed shirt and full cover shoes.  Mr Doawu, his father who seemed to know much about the need to have formal education quickly sewed beautiful school unifo...