1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE: LEVEE BREACH

You could see them in the distance, about 200 yards off. Two little girls with dishwater colored hair, trudging along the narrow farm-to-market road. Heatwaves rose off the pavement obscuring their faces, their bodies like upright pieces of cooked bacon, brown and wavy.
Lib guided the '53 Buick carefully onto the grassy edge beside the road, stopping it with a slight swoosh from the power brakes. Even though it was five years old, it was the fanciest car the family had ever had, bought during a period of prosperity fueled by ginning bumper crops of cotton.
She glanced at 18 year-old Neila, sitting quietly in the passenger seat. The cool interior belied the devastating heat of a July day in Texas. Both of them watched the approaching 8 year-olds, hot, dusty, but definitely not desperate. They walked at their normal pace toward the car, seemingly not in any hurry, proudly displaying their independence.
They had begged that morning to walk up the road about two miles to Lila's sister's house which sat in the middle of a cotton field. They wanted to play with Judy's babies, Lester, age 2 and Billie Jean, who was just 6 months old. Lib had packed them a lunch and snacks. The young mother cared for the children while her husband worked in the fields. She was 18, the same age as Neila, but she had dropped out of school three years ago. Neila would leave for college in a few months.
"Now don't ask for anything to eat or drink while you're there. I packed plenty for both of you." Lib admonished Felisa.
"Y'all don't stay too long either. She has a lot to do with those babies. Are you sure she wants you to come?"
"I'm sure. Lila talked to her Saturday when they came to town, and she knows we're comin'."
"Ok, then. Wear your tennis shoes and drink a lot of water. It's really hot."
"Lila said they don't have a phone. I don't know why, but anyway, we can't call you."
"Well, don't stay more than 2 hours, and then start home."
"Ok. Lila says the babies are really cute."
"They are, I'm sure. I never met a baby I thought was ugly."
"Really?"
"Really." she answered, handing her two brown paper lunchsacks stuffed with food.
The back door slammed, and Felisa and Lila set off on their big adventure.
Neila shot a knowing look at her mother. "Are you sure it's okay? It's at least two miles down there."
"She has to learn about the world sometime. She's too idealistic. She needs to see how other people live. And how fortunate she is."
"Yeah," I guess. Neila sounded unconvinced. She sometimes thought her mother too cavalier, too trusting of people, and too eager to let her children experience more troubling aspects of life. Her mother, the eternal optimist, the non-worrier, had just released the worryingest child she had to walk two miles to a sharecropper's cabin that lacked running water or an indoor toilet, things she had not experienced.

The girls climbed in the backseat. Deep sighs, then Lila immediately started babbling about the babies, how much fun they had, how glad Judy had been to see them, and planning the next trip out loud. She appeared not to notice that no sound was emanating from the seat occupied by her fellow traveler. Felisa stared out the window, silent. Lib and Ann knew better than to interrupt or pry. It would all come out, like stormwater breaking through a levee, but this wasn't the time.
They dropped Lila at her house, an old commercial building that had been converted to a home. The rooms were huge, as they needed to be for the large family of 12 children. She skipped happily toward the wooden steps that led up steeply to a small porch made of thick wooden planks salvaged from a railroad waiting platform. She turned to wave, kicking at the three mongrel dogs running up the steps to greet her.
"She's probably going to have some oatmeal and sugar for a snack," Felisa said flatly.
"Do you like that?" Neila asked.
"No, I choke on it, but that's all they have over there. That house didn't have any paint on it." This without a breath between sentences. "And those little babies have to wear dishcloths for diapers. And the floor has so many cracks in it between the boards that there is dirt all over the floor and the babies crawl in it, and then they cry, and it smears a dirt smear on their face and then they wet their "diaper" (this said with a look of disgust), and then there's mud on their legs, and it is so hot there you can't even hardly breathe, and the flies and bugs are in there because she leaves the front door and all the windows wide open to try to get a breath of air. And they have an outdoor toilet, and it stinks and has flies everywhere and wasps in the corners and spiderwebs and no telling what is under that hole you're supposed to sit on, so I just held it and now I really have to go to the bathroom. And there's nowhere to wash your hands except in a bowl that everybody else has washed their hands in and the baby's bottoms have been washed in, and oh my gosh, I just feel so sorry for them. Why would she want to have those babies when it's so bad for her already? She doesnt' sing to them or smile at them like we all smile at babies. And even if Lila said she was glad to see us, she didn't smile at us when we got to the house. She let us give the babies some of our lunch food and snacks. That's the only time I saw her smile. Lila can go back, but I don't want to."
Mother and Neila sat quietly, listening to the levee break. The water swirled through the breach and over, coursing its way through the carefully crafted banks, destroying what had been there. It couldn't be put back. It was too strong and swift. Sometimes water like that spread out in the fields on the other side, making the grass grow, the flowers flourish, and the soil moist and life-bearing. Sometimes it sat, dark, mossy, and stagnant in the fields breeding mosquitos and snakes.
Installed