Seed that comes up

The store on the siding

We sit against the line at Wesselsbron, in the shed the co-op put up when the branch still carried grain, and we sell what a farmer actually plants: seed, lick, compost and lime. Everything is weighed and bagged on this floor, and the person who loads your bakkie is the same one who answers the phone in February when the stand comes up thin. Seed that went out of this door last summer planted a little over nine thousand hectares between Bothaville and Hoopstad. We rail as far as De Aar and Upington, and we deliver by road anywhere inside four hours of the shed. The store has stood on this siding since 1974, under three owners, and the scale in the corner is older than all of us. Moving one bag to a farm gate costs R38, and it goes on the invoice as its own line so you can see exactly what you paid for it.