This story is excerpted from a workshop conducted in Yancey County, North Carolina in September 2026 with RL Silvers.

I was born on that mountain back there, midwife. Back there hither on Hog Branch, where them hogs turned over a lot of rock and eat the worms under. Yeah, my daddy had an old red mule when I was about four or five years old. My mother said he’d put that mule. She’d go to the field and help him pull corn. He’d put that mule on that, me on that mule and tie my feet, I wouldn’t fall off and plow corn all day to that mule.