I looked at the two completed entries and put the copies in the folder.

Then Harper began to cry, and the folder went onto a shelf while I picked her up.

That was becoming the pattern.

A legal step, a practical task, a baby needing something.

None could occupy every hour, and the people helping me had to understand that my pace was not an invitation to make decisions without me.

One morning, Dad found me at the kitchen table with a bottle beside a work notebook.

“Already?” he asked.