Momma don’t talk much about Baby Harriett, and I don’t ask. Things back then just happened to folks. Not much you can do bout it. Whooping cough, ‘sumption, the pox─ they took the young, the old, the in-between─ pickin’ and choosin’ random-like.

I think bout her itty-bitty body all red and scrunched up. Reckon she never suffered much─ gone afore she got a belly full. Don’t mean we don’t miss her, cause we do.

I’m still at the old place tending the garden and watering the cottonwood tree Momma planted not long after Harriett died. Every night Momma would sit under that tree and sing a lullaby─ her way of mourning, I guess. That tree took right off, grew like crazy.

Makes me wonder