Departure

THIS is it.

I am reminded now of a moment some ten months ago when I took the few minutes before finally stepping out of my room to write something named Departure. Even then I knew an era would be ending, and that was what I spoke of.

Life moves on. Even as we sit here willing time to stop, it wraps us up in its swift channel and whether we have our bags or not, it's taking us home. On this last night we sew up the fabric of this life around us, cocooning ourselves in Ghana, in our memories, in our love for this place that it may never let us free.

We will get over it, as all things pass. But at least for me it will take time. And what our loved ones must understand is this passage, when perhaps it will take only a song or a picture to leave us stranded in the despair of this ending, that it is not the things around us that make it hard, it is rather that we created something so beautiful and cannot go back to it.

Of course as we go back each will be thrown into the tumult of beginnings, but for now it is only the emptiness that strikes us.

Now it really is the last minute. The stress of today, cleaning packing goodbye-ing.....

And I am now
Afia Panyin

Here we go.