A really fine lady passed today. My last great aunt. [View all]

"Auntie" is what we called her, but in Mississippi it's pronounced "Aintie." She was 97, and until sometime in the last year she lived independently, a widow for many years.

She didn't do great things, but she was the most even tempered, welcoming, easygoing woman I've ever known. She was very smart, a voracious reader. When I was a little kid and lived in what wasn't the easiest or most bedrock household, her house was one I loved to visit. They had a nice little house, and a fine little dog, and things just seemed secure.

My grandmother, who did a good bit of our raising, was one of a bunch of kids, and now all of them are gone. They were characters, the lot of them, ranging from preachers to rounders, with quiet, stable Auntie in the middle.

May she cross easy. I doubt she knew how much she was loved.