Roots like anchors tethered me there on my verandah in the midst of a balmy breeze where I would read to him, my uncle. He had not learnt the letters but he valued them. Often asking me to get the Bible and read so deeply that when I first arrived in this grey jungle, swathes of Word would breathe through me.
I remember too, his callous but portentous words. This “bitch” he said, was going to be a teacher. And right he was too, for those days spent hunkered down on concrete graves and shaded by crotons, I was writing a future I could not see yet.
And his grandson, who I taught so patiently was one they said would never, if ever, learn. I was related to them but by some ‘graced gene’, I learnt quickly and well. To this day though they are known for their ignorance, their lack of academic proficiency and when a new child arrives who reaches above it all to know the letters, they are praised; revered
No wonder though that tears washed me when I watched a Nigerian girl tell of her tale of discovering her Dyslexia. It’s so simple in this new world to know that there is an answer for the struggle in which they have been perpetually captured. But I don’t know if they know.
I don’t know where Jamaicans are in their recognition of learning disorders. When our children are unable to read or learn in line with others, are they still buttus and dunces? Or has the narrative been elevated to give place to the truth of multiple intelligences? Do we now see beyond the what is to what could be when reasonable adjustments are made?
I probably should know the answers but I don’t. I have travelled so very far from home. I can hear the voices though; the ones like Oladoyin’s that are crying in the wilderness. And just like that, in the blink of an eye, I am still tethered there on my verandah in the midst of a balmy breeze.
https://www.bbc.com/pidgin/tori-54963307 (Dyslexia by Oladoyin)
she is: sendt 