At one point Dad asked Chad how his mother liked her potatoes, and Chad admitted he did not know.

He grew quiet for a moment, then promised to ask her that evening.

After he left, I said, “You trust him awfully quickly.”

“I trust him to help with beans,” Dad answered.

“The rest of trust takes longer.”

I wrote that down in the margin of my notes, though it would never appear on a county application.

On Monday, I drove Dad to the county office with a folder so thick the elastic band barely held it closed.

We had photographs of every garden row, the original notice, an outline of the distribution schedule, proof of the property’s ownership history, and Louise’s signed letter.