As long as I can remember, going to the farm had always given me a hell of a bang as a kid.
As I watched these labourers toiling on my farm, I recalled with nostalgia how we scrambled to follow our dad to the farm. I always felt so excited and on cloud seven when we were allowed to plant. It wasn't maize or rice at the time. The predominant crops then were cotton and groundnut. My siblings and I were only allowed to plant in all the several kinds of work like ploughing, weeding, using hoes and ploughs made locally by blacksmiths. What I longed to do then was to be taught how to weed using a hoe, but I was never allowed.
One incident I could never forget was when my knee got stuck while I was coming down a mango tree. One leg was already down on the ground but the right knee got stuck between two branches of the mango tree. Try as I might, I couldn't free my leg. My brothers and cousins were still up on the tree looking down, like little monkeys, to see how I would free myself, without assisting me. Gradually, I worked myself into a panic. Then I began to cry and shout at the top of my voice. My dad, from afar, came running towards us, skipping the ridges three at a time. Soon he reached where we were and saw how I was stuck. He simply lifted me off the ground and my knee came off free. I was so relieved to see my feet free because I thought I was going to be left to sleep in the farm stuck like that.
For many years later, I used to dream about that incidence...🤣🤣🤣
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