Alma Sunderland~ Feb 26 1906- Nov 4, 1984

Alma better known to my immediate family as Bertha....

Alma Sunderland (Caron) was my mom's mother and I fondly always referred to her as Nana which bascially what the french canadians refer to their grandmother's. This is a writing that I should save for a big finish as some of my funniest stories refer to my grandmother. The reason I choose to open with it is simply because she is some of my favorite and fondest memories.

My grandmother and grandfather owned the house we lived in when I was a child in Lawrence. This was a 2 family home where they lived on the first floor and we lived on the second floor. My grandparents had 3 children Herbert, George and Joan.

A lot of the reason I look back a Bertha so fondly is because she had a lot to do with my childhood and really helped raise me as a young child. In 1974 my Grandfather died of a massive heart attack and my mother and I moved into the first floor to be with my grandmother. This filled 2 needs within the family 1) My grandmother would not be alone and 2) My mother had a 2nd adult to raise a child as she was a single parent.

My grandmother while a small woman at about 4"11 (She would always say 4"11 1/2 as if that 1/2 put her into the Avg person club) was a powerful lilttle woman in presence. She suffered from Arthritus, Nerves and Diabetes.

I had heard stories from my mom and uncles at family gatherings how "bertha" had quite the temper and how you needed to watch out for her 8 rings you would get smacked with. The humerous part of this was simply because Nana was getting her chain tugged just enough to irritate her and get her going. (there were no 8 rings)

This is not to say that she didn't have her french temper by any means.

The School my Uncle George attended as a youth wasn't far from my home. Anyone who has heard stories of old days gone by might remember being told of bein smacked by rulers for using the wrong hand to write etc. My Uncle George had a bit of a speech impedement that affected him till the day that he died. To give an example of this he could never say potatoe chips it was potata chos .....

Apparently a nun had made it a point of trying to correct my Uncles poor speach by smacking him with a ruler. While I could never (Or wanted to) believe it I had been told that my Grandmother promptly went down to the school and proceeded to physically threaten the nun about touching her child...

Maybe today she could have taken on the priests!!

More to come ...