My Father Tossed a Blue Savings Passbook into the Mud at Cedar Ridge

I opened the flaps of the cardboard box and reached through a layer of crumpled newsprint.

My fingers brushed cold metal.

I pulled the rusted butter cookie tin out of the box and set it flat on the granite counter.

The painted flowers on the lid were faded and scratched from decades of sitting in Beatrice’s closet.

“I recognize that tin,” Arthur said.

“You should,” I said.

“Half of your old legal career is folded up inside it.”

I took the lid off the tin.