Fred R. White

Thursday, February 26, 2026

My Uncle Fred died today. Nancy called to let me know and I was standing in the St. Charles church’s cemetery. I was looking toward the church at the time and took the POTD. Fred was 87 years old. He was the youngest in my dad’s family. He was the last of that generation on either side of my family and that feels very significant. Five of the kids in my dad’s family died in February, as well as their mother, so back off February. He had been fighting a lot of health issues for a while, but the last few weeks we’ve known the end was coming. He was the uncle I knew the best. He and his family moved around when I was a kid and we had quite a few vacations to go to see Fred. I remember him dancing enthusiastically at my wedding. He always had a joke. He always had a story. He always had a smile.

Our day started off with a 2-hour drive to Page’s Okra Grill. Our fabulous waitress, Tara, made our mealtime today even better than yesterday. We tried fried green tomatoes today. They had a marvelous breading and delicious pimento cheese, tangy pickled okra and tomatoes, as well as a peach and pepper jam. Wow. It was Barbara’s to share, and I ate more of everything with gusto. Wow it was good. Tara told us we were not allowed to have the same thing as we had yesterday, and we assured her we weren’t, until Keith had to repeat the red velvet banana pudding.

We went to the Old Slave Mart Museum in Charleston. There was a school group visiting just after we arrived and we joined the presentation being given to them. The guy doing the talk was very knowledgeable and the kids asked some pretty good questions. It really, really, really made me want to sub for a social studies teacher.

We visited the battery and walked on the seawall, looking out at Fort Sumter.

The wind was whipping us there, so we ran away. We walked around the historic district and admired houses and shops. The Rainbow Row houses are not nearly as interesting to me as most of the gorgeous big houses with verandas on multiple floors, (none of which I photographed) but they are famous.

We accidentally found ourselves on Philadelphia Alley, which I wanted to see but forgot the name and location.

Look how we figured out where we were. Such clever people.

I remembered the bow ties made of feathers from last time we were here. They are all so gorgeous.

Look! At! This! Dress! It had a bit of a mermaid look, but I didn’t get the whole thing. I love it.