I wasn’t scared of death because I had never been scared of the dirt, the earth, the soil that would smother me for the rest of time. When Daddy was here, he and Ma took me down Lake Shore Drive to Sixty-third, to Rainbow Beach, a couple times before I started school. There were times she was in a good mood, so Ma teased me about how I played in the dirt while they tried to coax me to water. I found a small sand dollar and gave it to her, thinking she could make a necklace out of it. From the knee height of a child’s dreams, I remember seeing swarms of Black people—laughing teenagers, playing kids, women with babies on their chests, and men with their babies’ legs slung over their shoulders—coming and going in the water. Strong, happy, close families—in spite of it all. Smiling, proud, and free. On our side of town, with our own kind, playing our own music, taking a much needed break—our way. One of the only times I saw my parents kiss each other was standing with the water just past their knees, outlined by that soft, lazy blue that shimmers when water meets sky. They had started the foreplay I knew they would finish much later that night. But for then, I was all that mattered. Daddy’s hands reached out and waved to me; Ma hung on his shoulders and nodded her head to let me know it was alright. But I never came; the dry scratch of sand satisfied me, to me a much softer feeling than the grittiness I was daily surrounded by. The water rocked and slid too much for me, like it couldn’t make up its mind. I was scared by it because I couldn’t control it, couldn’t hold or mold or shape it like I could the earth. Finally, Daddy and Ma gave up and joined me back on land—burying me up to my grinning face in the sand. I thought I could have died and gone to meet Jesus right there, under the soft, wet sand that coaxed me into deep sleep, under the brightest sunlight I had ever known, faster than a lullaby ever had.