Hattie Brown didn’t ask why I was spending every Saturday escaping my own house. She simply showed me how to prune branches, remove weeds, and recognize healthy roots. For hours, I worked beneath the peach trees, enjoying something I hadn’t experienced in months: being useful without being judged.
Eventually, I told her about my hospitalization, my parents’ embarrassment, and how my brother’s happiness seemed more important than my recovery. Hattie listened quietly. Then she pointed toward the damaged tree again. “People sometimes mistake a difficult season for the end of someone’s life,” she explained. I remembered those words all week.
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