The story of the song is fairly obvious, about a young boy who was taken every day to pay his respects to his sister who had died (probably before he was born). He wanted his mother to pay more attention to him, she's have to "drag [him] with protest" to help her tend the tree. The mother disconnected herself form her living family, "lay[ing] apart from everything but [her] carrot-headed daughter."
The story of the song is fairly obvious, about a young boy who was taken every day to pay his respects to his sister who had died (probably before he was born). He wanted his mother to pay more attention to him, she's have to "drag [him] with protest" to help her tend the tree. The mother disconnected herself form her living family, "lay[ing] apart from everything but [her] carrot-headed daughter."