About

My early childhood was spent on our family farm outside Durban, in a huge old ramshackle homestead with a stone kraal near the house where the animals slept each night. My doting grandparents who lived there too read us stories and gave us treats. Our pets, farm animals and fairies were protagonists in the stories in my mind. The animal kraal, a spreading fig tree and a storeroom under the house were great settings.

We returned to the suburbs for my school years. Friends, neighbours and our pets (including Noel the duck and Cuthbert the juvenile crocodile) inspired further adventures recorded in my diary which had a key. Cuthbert ate insects found by local children in their garden compost heaps. Noel gathered his own food. He had an aversion to the owners of the vegetable vans that sold fresh produce. They screamed at him as he dive-bombed them and tried to take their wares. 

A WWII Auster plane occupied the garage for much of my childhood. Its wings rested in the rafters above it. Flying away in that aeroplane, conversing with killer whales and dolphins off our small ski boat and solving mysteries from the rickety tree house on a platform in the frangipani tree were inspirations for many stories.

Now as a farmer’s wife, so many wonderful memories have been made and experiences shared in our beautiful surroundings. The changing seasons. The birth of calves and lambs. Garden birds building nests and the arrival of the migratory birds each year. Seeds germinating and producing crops.

One memory I will savour, was meeting an aardvark as we drove up to a farm gate one evening. It panicked and started to excavate a hole to hide in. Its strong front claws dug quickly and red dust rose in between us.  The longer hind legs with spade shaped toes helped the animal keep its balance as it leaned into the crater.  After a minute with its ears folded back and its coat now the colour of the soil, the shy mysterious nocturnal mammal turned and left, leaving quite a big hole to be negotiated. It staggered a little as it ran, but still managed to speed off … 

I thought about that aardvark often. I named him Victor. What was his story?     

By Bridget Johnson