GREAT AUNT SOOTER

SUBTLE SWEET AUNT SOOTER Aunt Sooter's real name was Dedove Merriweather. I became first conscious of Aunt Sooter as a very young boy when we lived in Canton, Mississippi, in the early 1950's. Daddy was away in St. Louis preparing a place for us to migrate to , while Mama, Schleria, Harold and me lived in our great-grandparents' home in Canton. Our great grandfather was renown: Reverend Walter Merriweather, his wife was Lily Brent Merriweather. They were the parents of Aunt Sooter and her eight siblings, one of whom, Ora Bell, is Mama's mother. So Aunt Sooter was my great aunt, grandmother's sister. Aunt Sooter was a quiet, subtle woman with an unhurried way. She lived to be 94 and survived partial amputation of a leg that confined her to a nursing home in the end. I visited her there . She smiled and looked, said I was a "stout fellow!" One day while still in Canton, she had asked me to go around to the back of the house and to fetch her some small switches off that big weeping willow tree back there. I complied. But, when I came back, she said, "Not this. These switches are too small, Larry. Get back again. And bring me back three longer willow switches." Innocent, blithely, I complied again. Then, I watched curiously as she plaited, braided, the switches into one, cluelessly. When she was done, she quietly beckoned 3-year old me to her side. Then, wordlessly, tenderly she began to administer those plaited switches to my bare legs as her form of just compensation for some really minor, now-long-forgotten, indiscretion that I "may" had done . Switching stings! I do remember. Anyway, Daddy returned and we moved from Canton, Mississippi to St. Louis, Missouri on the "Spirit or City of New Orleans" train that was packed with lots of colored folks going North. Most of Aunt Sooter's siblings also went North to Chicago or elsewhere. But Aunt Sooter and "Mother", grandmother Ora Bell, ( who packed up an unforgettably delicious lunch of fried chicken, chocolate cake for our train ride) remained in Canton all life . Mother died in Canton many years later. After migrating, we would only see Aunt Sooter periodically, thereafter, when we went "back home," as Daddy would say, to visit on vacations. Years flew by, becoming decades; then came graduations, marriage, a child of my own and the legal profession to keep me busy. Then one day it was joyfully announced by Mama that Aunt Sooter, who then lived alone, who had long since been widowed, was coming to stay with her and Dad. By this time, I lived in Kansas City and most --if not all--of my seven younger siblings had moved on, away from 334 Eldridge, Rockhill. That left Mama, Daddy and Aunt Sooter together to live out their "golden years", so to speak. But as the quest for gold is still laden with strife and controversy, so was their household! Our strong-willed and demonstrative Daddy "duked" it out with sweet, subtle Aunt Sooter over whatever , whenever, daily . If Daddy was invidious, Aunt Sooter was insidious. What did they argue about? Heaven knows! Old folks do are like dogs and cats, sometimes. Meanwhile, Mama , Mrs . Margie Dean Coleman, looked on, listening refereeing umpiring , laughing lecturing preaching , praying; most of all greatly enjoying confraternity between husband, Elvis Mitchell Coleman and sweet Aunt Sooter! Nothing like family memories!  (Aunt Sooter is bottom left; grandmother Ora Bell is also bottom of this Merriweather family photo, picturing maternal great aunts and uncles)