Grandma has “Left”

This post is a bit of a bitterweet one for me to write.  My maternal grandmother, Eleanor Alma Fransen, passed away yesterday, December 18th, 2007 @ approximately 2:50pm.  She was about 2 weeks short of her 91st birthday.  She was a wonderful woman that will be fondly remembered by all and will continue being loved by everyone in my family. 

Her “leaving” (as my grandma used to always call dying) is bittersweet.  She had been in constant pain for quite a number of years.  This did not seem to slow her down until the last 3 or so years, when she suffered macular degeneration and lost the majority of her eyesight.  For this reason, her “leaving” means that she is in a much better place and will no longer struggle with the pain that has constantly plagued her for the last number of years of her life. 

My grandma was born in 1916 during World War I in Wisconsin, where, in Superior, she met my grandfather.  After moving to Evanston (now a northern suburb of Chicago), Illinois, they were actually married in private unbeknownst to both their families.  They married publically a couple of years later.  Their parents never knew of their first marriage.  While in Evanston, my mother was born.  Shortly thereafter, in 1947, they made the very big move out from Evanston to El Rio, California, where my grandfather built the house that they settled in on Collins Street.  My grandparents were founding members of Our Redeemer Lutheran Church in Oxnard, CA and helped to build both the congregation and actual physical parish church and buildings.

After the death of my gradfather, Leonard Carl Fransen, in 1972 from brain cancer, my grandmother continued living in the house until she sold it in about 1979 and moved into the granny cottage behind my parents’ home in El Rio where she continued to live until my parents moved to Simi Valley in February of this year.  After the move, my grandma lived in a bedroom at my parents’ new home in Simi Valley. 

 We had a long and wonderful relationship with my grandma and can truly say that she enriched our lives in more ways than I could ever ennumerate in a blog entry.  We Love Her and Will Miss Her With All of Our Hearts and Souls! 

Godspeed Grandma.