I would be lying if I said that Sol and I never fought. Once, we got into an argument that ended up involving both our families and a formal traditional apology. It started innocently enough, with a visit from his older sister, Lydia. She enjoyed baking bread and was keen to bake some for us. So she made some dough, put it in a baking tin, revived the fire in the coal stove and shoved the baking tin in, not realising that inside the oven were already bowls of food that I had dished up for the children and left in there to keep warm. It was only later, when she went back to check on the bread, that she saw the smoke of the badly burnt food.

The food had to be thrown away. The children were in tears. Without thinking, I muttered the line that I always used to tease the children with when something went wrong and no one owned up. “Whoever did this should pack their bags and go back to the rural home in Butterworth,” I said. The children were scared of the goats and pigs at Sol’s family home, so this usually encouraged one of them to own up.

Unfortunately, Lydia took my words to heart. Without us noticing, she packed her small bag and left. It was only when Sol came home that we realised what had happened.

He called his mother at work. He was relieved to find Lydia there. When she told him what I had said, he grew very upset and would not listen to my explanations. The issue became so complicated that I eventually had to go the traditional route of apology, which involved me and two members of my family going to Sol’s house in Butterworth that weekend to say sorry to Lydia. I had never seen him so angry.

That Saturday, Uncle Elliot and I left early for Butterworth. Sol went to work. He would join us later, after the post office had closed. Fortunately for me our nanny, Ntsikie, who had witnessed the oven incident, managed to explain to him what I had meant in the time after he finished work but before he could leave for Butterworth. The children confirmed her story. Sol was happy and relieved. He went to Butterworth and explained to his family what had happened, apologising to my family for the trouble caused. It was all over within minutes.

Later on, I wrote Sol a letter to apologise. That was the beginning of a little ritual between the two of us: I would write letters to him to explain myself or raise some issue, and he would read them late at night, after his dancing lessons, over his evening coffee. The letter system worked well, opening long discussions about family issues. In this way our bond grew deeper, along with our ability to trust and support each other.

Sol and I firmly believed our children should help out around the house. Sol drew up a roster, assigning tasks to each child – mostly simple jobs like tidying up the house, washing the dishes and making tea for guests and us when we came home from work – and gave them little financial incentives for effort and jobs well done. In this way, we taught them the importance of taking responsibility and managing their time.

It was amusing to see how different my children were when it came to the chores. Andile, with his love for group work, enjoyed washing dishes with his siblings, and always wanted to be the one to dry the clean dishes before handing them on to someone else to pack away. But the chore he enjoyed the best was polishing the stoep. He loved seeing the stoep gleam in the sunlight after he had polished it. Not so Linda. Many years later, when Andile left to go to boarding school in Standard Six and Linda took over his responsibilities, the job he hated the most was polishing the stoep. We once found him crying on the stoep, complaining that he had hurt his left foot while polishing. But I wasn’t convinced because the following morning he complained about his right foot.

While the younger children were still in primary school, Sol and I started a family business on the side, weaving handbags out of sisal and nylon strings. The business was called “Sol-Con Hand Works”, a blend of my and Sol’s names. Everyone was involved in some way, based on what they enjoyed doing. Sol did the budgeting and placed the orders for materials. Tammie was already at boarding school by then, but when he was around he would help by taking stock of our materials and cutting the string to length. Little Tura would prepare the strings for weaving and hand them on to bigger brother Dudu, who would do most of the weaving, blending the colours of the strings most beautifully. Dudu was the only one of my children who could make a bag from start to finish.

Dudu would then hand the almost-finished bag to me to knit closed, fit the handle and sew in the lining that Nomhamha had made.

Nomhamha was a quick learner – I had only to teach her how to sew the linings once and she never failed to finish her work after that.

Andile would then count and pack the bags if there was an order. During the festive season, he would volunteer to take the bags to the beach to sell to the white tourists. Sol always went with him, to help carry the heavy suitcase filled with bags, and to ensure that they came home safe and sound with the money still in their pockets. I remember Sol telling us one December evening that Andile had refused to leave the beach until he had sold every last one of the handbags in that suitcase. They came home late that day, tired but victorious, carrying a very empty suitcase home.