Miss Cox's Garden

I remember the morning I worked in the wet clay of Miss Cox's garden in 1937. It stuck sumptin fierce to my rubber boots till they was so heavy with the red stuff I could scarcely walk. But I straighten'd to see the sun rise above the trees, the clouds surroundin' it lit with fire.

It was one of those moments when there aint no words. I stood a long time, statue-still. I didn't even have the sense to pray.

Ever know a person who has that effect on a body? Love so pure it shines like the mornin' sun?

Such a one is not easily forgotten.

Up afore sunup, I had walked down Proper street and beneath the railroad underpass to the Cox's property on the corner of Wick and Young streets.

Miss Farris had a wicker basket and a safari hat settin' on the porch for me. She was Miss Cox's mama visitin' to help with the baby. I picked up the basket and left the hat, but soon regretted leavin' it when I had to stump back to the porch with my muddy boots for it once the Mississippi sun started to boil the back of my neck.

I hadn't picked vegetables or pulled weeds from a garden since grammar school so I was hopin' for the Good Lord's help to keep from pullin' plants that twern't weeds and vice versa. When in doubt Ella Robertson, I said to myself, better leave it for those that knows what their about!

I didn't pull many weeds, sad to say. I knew them wild morning glories winding about the corn stalks didn't belong, but they was so purty I didn't have the heart to dig them out of the sticky clay.

And I almost forgot! A mocker had a nest in one of Miss Cox's pecan trees and every time I came to the end of a row near them trees it would barrel out and dive at me like a barnstormer at the state fair!

But after a while, we declared a truce and he let me alone and busied his saucy self singin' a different melody every few seconds like it twere a contest to see how many he knew by heart. After almost an hour of his whistling, squeekin' and squawkin' I started to wish he would attack me instead.

After I filled my basket with tomatoes, okra, snap peas and green peppers, Miss Farris came out to see how I was gettin' on.

I asked her how the baby was doin' and she said He's squallin' jus' like a champion hog. I can't tell you how pleased I was to hear it. The poor little fella was born the week before, Miss Cox and her mama movin' heaven and earth to keep him alive another day.

When my husband, Doc Robertson, came home the evening he was born, he tole me, I just deliver'd the nearest thing to nothin' I ever saw. I doubt he'll last the night.

So, I brought a dish of food the next day to see what I could do to help. But seeing that poor little baby, his tiny face pinched and red, I felt a wave of terror roll over me like the angel of death had entered the squalor of their little home.

Where's his daddy? I asked afore Miss Farris gave me a dark stare. Miss Cox was trying to get the baby to suckle. But he kept pullin' away, his eyes squeezed tight, his faint and gasping cries breakin' my heart with fear for his safety.

He had two older brothers and an older sister. The two boys stood together, shoulder to shoulder, the bigger one's hair a tumble of black curls and the smaller a dirty blond, hair ruler straight, pancaked atop his small head. The girl stood close to her mama, her wide, brown eyes starin' at me like a pair of saucers.

Their clapboard shack was scarcely more than four ragged walls with a roof overhead. It had two rooms, one for Miss Cox and her absent husband and one for the three children. It had two little beds, one for the two boys and another for the girl, separated only by a sheet hanging from the ceiling.

Miss Farris tole me later that Mr. Cox had been off drinkin' for a couple weeks. I knew that meant no work and no work meant no money. I was too shamed for them to know what to say.

I soon learnt there twern't no meat nor bread in the house and no flour to even whip up some biscuits. Thank the Good Lord for the vegetable garden, or there would've been nothing to eat at all. One thing leadin' to another, I started comin' by every morning to help as best I could. I brought fried chicken, white bread and self-rising flour the next day.

When they ran out of sorghum molasses, I brought some of that too. The two women were tireless. They had made a makeshift incubator out of bricks that they heated in the oven and used it to keep him warm at night. When I tole Doc Robertson about it, he rolled his eyes and shook his head in disbelief.

Course 'ventually I took leave of my senses and offered to care for Miss Cox's garden and there we were, Miss Farris lookin' at my pitiful results and me wishin' the mocker would attack us both.

She asked me then if I had ever snapped peas. Not since I was a girl, I tole her. Well now, we sat on the porch together on a pair of rockers and snapped peas together for an hour into broad steel bowls. We didn't say much till I finally asked her if she thought her grandson would live.

She paused for a moment or two and looked at me sharply. Have you known Miss Cox long? she asked with a furrowed brow.

No, I haven't. I confessed.

Her two older boys both knocked at death's door and their mama's love called them back. The oldest got bad sick - Diphtheria - during the epidemic in the early 30s. He never got the medicine he needed.

When love has anything to say about it at all, life finds a way.

If you had known Miss Cox, like I know her, you would've never asked. The thought never would've entered your head.

I know it probably don’t need saying, but that little boy who weighed less than two pounds when he was born in that sorry shack, lived. He burned as brightly in life as the Mississippi sun shown that morning I worked in Miss Cox's garden.

Sometimes, there just aint no words.