It is frustrating to have something to say and not be able to say it. It is even more frustrating to try to say it and not say it as well as you would like to. This is a stammerers way of life, we go through it daily. Our world is full of anger, disappointments and frustrations. People have come to label us ‘an angry lot,’ maybe we are, but
maybe it is because the fluent speakers think we are slow or are wasting their time.
There was a young man who went to borrow an axe from a neighbor. Upon arrival, as is the custom before he could say what he wanted the host offered him a mug of tea. He accepted, and then sat to drink the local version of a cold coke. Then all of a sudden another young man came into the compound and asked for the axe. The host brought it to him but the first man stood up and said that’s what had brought him to the home as well. The host was caught in an awkward position.
I like to tell the above story but I have never thought that the first man may have been a stammerer. It happens to us a lot, we agonize and prepare to say something then back off at the last minute. We have thus lost opportunities or seen what we want slip away just because we could not say what we wanted at the right time.
Watch out for the caller who seems to take long to speak on the other end. Sometimes the world moves so fast for us, and what we can do is to keep what we have to say in our hearts. Who can stand the jerks, gyrations, blocks and prolonged speech? It is worse when you hang up on me. A lady hanged up on me around March and I have never called her since. It is the harshest thing someone can do to us. Nevertheless, we get hang-ups every day, when we can’t say what we want to say. The phone is the worst invention to have been made, just ask any stammerer.
If you have not read the new constitution, please do so. It is against the Kenyan Constitution to complete sentences for a stammerer or hang up the phone on them. Oh yes, this year’s International Stammering Awareness Day is about sharing stories and changing perceptions.
Share with us on www.nairobistammering.wordpress.com
© 18th September 2011 kenyatta otieno
No comments:
Post a Comment