Who Are You?

I had barely walked into the Interactive Media department of the company I work with than a colleague asked: “What do you call that plastic thing at the ends of a shoe lace?” For a moment it seemed I was sitting on the hot seat of Kafui Dey’s ‘Who Wants To Be Rich?’ programme waiting to attempt an answer to the penultimate question where one wins GHS 25,000.00. I shrugged and carried out the motive which took me there in the first place, but not after a bout of laughter from them.

It wasn’t after a couple of hours had passed when a colleague from the IT department walked into my office than I remembered the question. This bizarre reminder and quest for knowledge drove me straight to ‘google’ it on my phone. An aglet, it is called. I relayed the answer to him and was given a thumps up. Later in the evening, I again accessed the internet on my phone, and realized I hadn’t closed the tab on which I found the answer to the brain teaser. I proceeded to scroll down to satisfy my curiosity. The webpage had this for a definition:   

An "aglet" is the name given to the plastic or metal tip on the end of a shoelace. Despite their simplicity, aglets perform several functions:

• They stop the ends of the shoelaces from unraveling;
• They make it easier to hold the ends of the shoelaces when lacing;
• They make it easier to thread the shoelaces through the eyelets or lugs;
• They provide a colourful or decorative finish to the laces.

The functions of the aglets fascinated me, and in that state, my mind was transported from thoughts of shoe lace to ‘people’.

We live in a world where service to mankind has gradually become alien to mortals. Last week, a video in which a monster of a maid in Uganda nearly snuffed life out of an innocent toddler went viral. My mouth was gaping throughout the watch. My mum and aunties were left in tears when they saw it. Friends were outraged with a few swearing to kill the monster if they were to be in the shoes of the parents. Even if was the case that the parents were maltreating the maid, couldn’t she have simply packed out of the house rather take it out on the poor baby, I thought to myself.

Inasmuch as we are justified in our angst, can we spare a moment to think of our own ‘flaws’? We may not physically be as monstrous as the maid, but we ‘murder’ others with our actions or the lack of it. We see people in need, but look away. We see people in anguish, and go to town with it, laughing out loud. We see people being wrongly accused, but look on for an evil act to be perpetuated. The rights of the vulnerable are being trampled upon every day, yet we do nothing about it. We see people who are in terrible situations and in need of empathy and encouragement, but our utterances maim them for life.

The aglet stops the ends of a shoelace from unraveling. Can same be said about you? What are you doing about that young man in your vicinity whose life is crumbling due to inebriation? Do you try to stop him from hitting the self-destruct button?

The aglet also makes it easier to thread the shoelaces through the eyelets of a shoe. As an employee who’s found another job, do you ensure that your successor finds the handing over notes easy to read, thereby making his work easier? Or you, just like your predecessor, ensure he also finds it as challenging as you did?

It also provides a colourful and decorative finish to the lace. Do you go out of you way to help other people be as successful as you are…..perhaps more successful? Do you challenge your protégé to be a better leader than you are? Do you ensure that another finds life easier than you did? Does another find that guiding light in you?

Interestingly, Jesus Christ, in Matthew 25:31-46 paints a graphic picture of the day of reckoning, and forcefully makes the point that charity to mankind is charity to God. And this is a criterion for admission into Heaven.

My name is Paa Kwesi Bentum Williams, and I pledge to be an aglet henceforth. Do I hear you also make that solemn vow?