It all stated with Little Grandma

I was thinking today that I am almost 75 and my time left in this life may be short.  It could be another 20 years, or another day.  I’m at that age where every little twinge feels like terminal cancer.  Nobody knows.  And when I’m gone so many memories will also be gone.  This may be a good place to write them down.  The ones I remember and enjoy remembering.  Something for my kids and grandkids to get to know me and my family a bit better. 

All my grandparents came from Italy.  Except, maybe, my maternal grandmother (Nana Gene), who may have been born in Ishpeming, Michigan.  She was one of 16 kids and Great Grandma had trouble remembering where all of them were born.  Also, they were never sure if Nana Gene was born on June 12 or July 12.  We would celebrate in June but, if for some reason we couldn’t, we would move it to July.  As I said, Great Grandma had 16 kids, three sets of twins in a row, so you can understand her confusion.  Nana Gene was from Great Grandma’s first husband whose name was Costa, along with two other babies.  Then Grandma married a man maned LaCaria and all the kids took his name.  Her final husband, as far as we know, was named Pucci (or as she would say, P-u-chi-chi-i ).  I asked her once if the first two had died or if she got divorced.  Or if she was a bigamist! She just shrugged and walked away.  No one knows for sure. 

One thing we do know is her birthing techniques.  She would tell the story about going into labor with one of her sets of twins.  When the time came, she squatted down on some papers and had the baby.  After that she went back into the fields to do whatever, then had to go back in and squat again later in the day for the second one!  Not sure if this story is true but it is a fun story to tell.   So happy I didn't have to do that with my own twins!

Great Grandma was the quintessential little old Italian woman.  About 4’10”, chubby, one gold tooth, hair always gray and always in a bun, glasses, permanent apron, and stockings rolled down to just above her knees.  We all called her “Little Grandma”.  And she baked the best bread ever.

Little Grandma loved her soap operas.  One time my mom called her to say hi, and Grandma was crying on the phone.  Mom said, “What’s the matter?”  Grandma said, “Peggy died!”.  Mom didn’t have any idea who Peggy was, so she asked.  Turns out it was a character on one of her “stories”.  She was devastated.

But she baked bread almost every day in an outside oven someone built for her.  Raised chickens, had the whole family in her tiny house every Christmas Eve, and raised a few of her grandchildren.  I’m just sorry my kids never got to know her.  She had a stroke at the age of 87 a couple of weeks before my twins were born and died a month later. 

My kids never got to know any of my relatives from the old country and they would have loved knowing them.