This story is called…

There are shades everywhere here, of the kind that Marguerite Poland envisaged – the ancestors, stories, history and heritage of a place, and its continued influence on a people. It is unfashionable today to talk about shades, about the dead, about the past and about God. But everyone has roots. Everyone comes from somewhere.

It is in this part of South Africa where my parents recently purchased a plot of land to retire. It is a place where they saw their own future, the next chapter of their lives, intertwining with their past, a time to look back now, reflect, take stock and build once more.

My father began his mission by surveying the area and assessing the quality of the soil. I remember one of the first questions he asked me, was, where does the wind come in from? Everywhere (I thought) possibly, over there?

He continued to buy second-hand books about gardening in the Midlands. And digested them, never complaining about the tough, sometimes exhausting process of gathering and analysing information. He spoke with locals cementing strong networks of informal relationships.

His vision for the garden was earnest – it had to survive the first winter. So he planted Camphor trees in the east to shield the garden from the sometimes devastating south easterly wind. The shrub is good for hedges and keeping wild animals out. There are a few Riverbush Willows, popular shade trees, surprisingly drought and frost-resistant, and fast-growing under good conditions. He wanted strong, tall trees in the front of the house, and quickly.

He planted the deciduous White Stinkwood, alone on a rocky outcrop – an African bonsai of sorts. He countenanced the small tree with Gazanias - grown for the brilliant colour of their flower and their tolerance of dryness and poor soils. He potted his ornamental annuals on the front verandah as pretty introductions to first-time visitors, knowing that the fickle things would perish first at the onset of winter. He planted Proteas and Redhot Pokers to embolden the shrubbery.

He cleared the garden of all exotic plants and trees, knowing that initially, at least, this meant his garden would look barren. In a typical stroke of genius-cum-craziness he telephoned a horticulturist in Wellington, Cape Town and ordered 50 vines of cabernet-franc. He planted a small vineyard in the middle of KwaZulu-Natal because the climates are similar, he said.

I remember when the first winter came - it wiped out almost everything in his garden, despite the detailed planning and simple vision. I felt especially sorry for the vineyard. But even the hardier trees had taken a beating. The wind had been unforgiving. The hail, too, seemed to have reminded him that his arrival was contingent upon accepting the natural way of life up there - a rite of passage, a reckoning with the shades.

But he laughed, and told me not to worry. He said that deciding what kind of garden you want is the important thing. Once you have decided what you want it to look like, once you have worked hard to determine what you think will work, you have to get your hands dirty. Solving problems. Watering the garden. Planting, replanting. He always said that the worst thing you can do is to take yourself too seriously. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t. And, that if I wasn’t prepared to get on my knees and weed, then I shouldn’t get in the garden; I shouldn’t begin to plant.

Like the young South Africans in Shades and Cry the Beloved Country, I too have made my way to Johannesburg in search of work, and to find my way in the world. It is where I learnt to walk. On the streets. The political issues these books deal with are not bound to the 1890s and mid-1950s; their heritage speaks to the present - Johannesburg is still the same in many ways. It is still a great city for young prospectors. And the politics is still equally harsh. Whenever I hear about the so-called crisis in leadership, I hear his voice whispering, a crisis in weeding.

There are so many South African stories that haven’t been told. So many ordinary but extraordinarily moving descriptions of Ixopo that haven’t been written. So many men that have fallen in love with Johannesburg but have died before telling their story.

Dad, you always dreamt of writing, but never got around to it. I remember the crime novel that you threatened to write about your fictional character, Jim Fennor, but never did because mom so laughed at the first few pages. And now, after 15 years of Parkinson’s disease – an incurable, silent and slow killer – writing is sometimes difficult. No one has read your story. That you were raised as a refugee in a country destroyed by war. That your father died as a 37-year-old miner in a coal pit in the South of Wales. That your mother cleaned toilets as a widow. And that you were forced to work in a factory from the age of 16 working with chemicals that contributed to the development of your illness.

National Heritage Day is about celebrating cultural heritage – recounting the legacies inherited from past generations, maintained in the present and bestowed for the benefit of a future generation. Intertwining stories about our country, its past and its future. Drawing on the history of struggle that is common to humanity. Everyone uses fire to cook, we just call it braaing.

Today, I know you will be in your garden, weeding. It is this enduring image that is the bedrock of my own legal and political activism. For my own developing theory of leadership and management. To be creative enough to build my own vineyards where people least expect it and to challenge the limits of what we believe is possible. It is a legacy I am now beginning to pass onto others, especially as we enter a politics of winter. Today, in remembering, I etch your story onto folklore because shades require naming. This story is called Jim Fennor. Happy 62nd birthday. Happy National Heritage day.