Going to the Refuneral, A Tribute to Aunt Witt Carter 6/20/1922 - 11/30/2025

Aunt Witt at Fred's House July 2024

I always enjoyed listening to my Aunt Witt tell me stories about her and my father growing up, how much they loved each other like brother and sister, and playing going to the refuneral. This is how I imagined it.

Little Witt and Little Buddy were six-year-old cousins but loved each other like sister and brother. Their mothers were sisters and they all lived together in a big house. Witt and Buddy did everything together, like watching the circus parade and jumping off the garage with umbrellas, but that’s another story. Witt and Buddy had a big family with many aunts and uncles, who lived on farms, in big cities, or other faraway places. They only saw them during special occasions like funerals and family reunions.

Going to the family reunion was a fun time. Witt and Buddy’s mothers would fill the house with sweet smells of cakes and pies cooking, hot breads baking and all kinds of good foods cooking on the stove. Sometimes relatives would drive over from faraway places and spend the night...

The day of the reunion was like a big picnic party. Grandpa would be there, cousins we had not seen in a while, and aunts and uncles picking you up, turning you over and saying things like, “Look how big you’ve gotten.” Then the feasting would begin, all the food you could eat spread out on tables under trees as far as the eye could see. After eating the grown-ups would hold a meeting while us kids ran around and played. Soon the sun would start to set, and our mothers would call to us kids - “Carry this pot to the car… Wipe the grass from your hair… How did you get your dress wet, and your pants dirty?” 

Then it would become sad. All the grownups would hug each other, holding back tears as they said goodbye and shouted, “See you next year,” waving and crying through open car windows and atop buggies, as they slowly rolled away, down the dirt road. But Buddy and me didn’t cry because we had each other, and we would see each other forever.

Going to funerals was the same but different, kind of backwards. The sadness would be at the beginning, family members crying and hugging as soon as they saw each other. We gathered sometimes inside the church, other times outside the church where big square rocks stuck out of the ground. The grownups would have a meeting of sorts, someone would speak, saying something serious everyone paid attention to, except us kids. We had to sit still but Buddy and me still made funny faces at each other. 

We always sat next to each other or sometimes our mommas would sit between us holding hands. That’s what it was like when Grandpa died. Mom and Aunt Hazel, that’s who I’m named after, held each other’s hands when their daddy died. But after the meeting was over, the grownups would eat, laugh, and be happy again. It was hard for Buddy and me to know the difference, so we called them “refunerals.” 

Buddy and I liked playing, “going to the refuneral.” I would make the food, and Buddy would drive the car. We had an old beat- up Model T Ford in the driveway, no wheels, but it was our play car. I would sit in the seat while Buddy cranked the shaft. He liked to make car noises too –"putter, putter, crank, crank, vroom!”

One day while Buddy was cranking the shaft and I was sitting in the car holding our food basket for the refuneral, suddenly Buddy yelled, “Ahhhh!” He covered his face with his hands and fell down. “Buddy! What’s wrong?” I jumped out of the car and saw blood dripping from hands as he screamed and rolled around on the ground. The crank handle slipped and hit Buddy across the bridge of his nose and split his nose wide open. “Momma! Aunt Hazel!” I yelled as I ran quick into the house. “Buddy hit his nose with the crank shaft; he’s bleeding bad,” I told them.

Momma and Aunt Hazel quickly carried Buddy across the street to the black lady’s house, that’s what we called her because she always wore black. Momma said the lady knew how to treat wounds. The black lady took us to her attic and put cobwebs on Buddy’s nose, and the bleeding stopped!

That night, Buddy’s nose was real big and red, like an apple, but it wasn’t bleeding. Momma and Aunt Hazel gave Buddy and me an extra piece of pie after dinner. Momma said, I was smart and real good at helping Buddy. She said that’s why we call you Witt, “Cause you got good sense.”

Now Witt and Buddy are going to the refuneral together again, and with Bill and all the relatives who are waiting for them in Heaven. And we will go too, someday

With love,

Cousin “little sister” Tina Cannaday DaCosta

Aunt Witt combing my hair and telling stories :)