In the garden of a house on a cobblestone street in the far West Village of Manhattan lives a tortoise named Sister Martha. No one knows why she’s called that, or how anyone knows Martha is a she. Or how old she is. Legend has it she was originally owned by a little boy who lived in the house fifty years ago. In the winter Martha burrows under the cool earth, disappearing right around Thanksgiving time, and reappears in April to live in the shade of the leafy green plants for the warmer months.

When during divorce I sold it, I thought I, like Martha, would simply move on to another leafy spot, carrying my home on my back. I had trained tendrils from the neighbor’s wisteria to grow up our drainpipe our first year in that house.