Today I say goodbye to my grandmother. I am sad she is gone and happy to have known her. She loved me like she did all her children, grand children and great grand children. I hope she knew I loved her too. In many ways its hard that I will never say goodbye to her being so far away from home but a part of her will always be with me.
The last time I saw my grandmother.
I do not know when my grandmother was born, no one does because there was no record kept of her birth at the time. She married my grandfather and had eight children, my mother being the youngest. By the time I was born, I can only estimate she was in her late sixties. I do not think she ever learnt to read or write but she knew the importance of education. She worked hard to send her children to school. In a generation when it was deemed unnecessary to send girl children to school she made sure all her children had equal opportunities. My mother told me how she would work on other people’s farms to raise school fees and in turn her children looked after her. She was proud of what her children accomplished and she expected her grandchildren to work hard as well. She did not leave us money but gave all of us a way to live.
I love to shell peanuts with my hands, I can do it for hours on end. It is therapeutic for me. One of the many things my grandmother taught me. She always made sure we had peanuts and peanut butter for school. She taught me how to make peanut butter from scratch and all the traditional Zimbabwean food. She also taught me how to weed the fields even though at the time she would do it with one hand.
If you were making green vegetables for her, you were best advised to cook them until they were brown otherwise she would not eat them. She liked her sadza very thin and every morning she would have mealie meal porridge with peanut butter. She would dip her bread in her tea because it made it easier for her to chew on her bread and as a child I would imitate her.
She told me many stories about her life and each time it made me appreciate how strong she was. When she had my mother, she walked to the clinic that was so far away and she had another toddler in tow, my aunt. I can only imagine what it was like to have to walk such a distance after giving birth with a toddler and a baby. It seemed to me when she told me this story, that this was the way it was and she accepted it. She also found ways to make her life easier, if she had to work with a fussy baby, she would tie the baby to a log to give the baby the illusion of being carried in a sling. Her life was not easy but she made the most of it. When three of her children died, a part of her died too. I do not remember her crying much but I remember her being sad and doing her best to move on even when it was hard.
I shall forever miss her and will celebrate her life always. I thank God for letting me and everyone in our family experience her love and pray to be half the woman that she was.