Mark's Nana... :(

Taken from the Lawrence Eagle Tribune...

LAWRENCE - Jennie (Lombardo) DeLuca, 92, of Lawrence, died Tuesday, Dec. 5, 2006 at Mary Immaculate Nursing Home in Lawrence. Jennie was born on Friday, Feb. 13, 1914, in Haverhill, to Salvatore and Lucia (Barbagallo) Lombardo. She attended Lawrence Schools and was a member of Holy Rosary Church. Jennie worked for Grieco Brothers, in Lawrence for 47 years and retired in 1977. She loved cooking for her family and friends and was devoted to her family especially her grandchildren and great grandchildren. Mrs. DeLuca was the widow of Salvatore DeLuca and is survived by a son, Robert DeLuca and his wife Olive of Haverhill; a sister-in-law, Carmela DeLuca of Florida; three grandchildren, Michele Basile and her husband Paul, Kenneth Deluca and his wife Sue and Mark DeLuca and his wife Kelly; eight great grandchildren, Robby, Kate, Sam and Jessica DeLuca, Jonathan and Ryan Basile and Matthew and Jillian DeLuca; as well as several nieces and nephews.

She was a wonderful woman. My favorite thing about her was when she'd tell me stories about when she was young. She'd tell me stories about how she met Nanu (Mark's grandfather) on her way to work and he offered her and her sister a ride but since she didn't know him, she refused, but her sister accepted the ride. :) Or how he was a wonderful dancer and they'd go dancing at Canobie Lake. :) And how during the depression, her family would help out other families in the area with home cooked meals. And a really cute story about how in those days, they didn't neuter cats, so when a cat had a litter of kittens, they'd take them to the river to drown them (don't worry, the cute part is coming). Well, Nana did that one day, and the mother cat was so upset and distraught that she went into the river and fished out her kittens one by one and saved them all. :) They ended up letting them live because they didn't have the heart to drown them after that. She'd tell stories about how Lawrence used to be in it's hey-day that would make me wish I'd been alive back then. And she was so proud of her grandchildren. She loved to tell me about how when Mark was little, he was in her back yard and looked up in the sky and saw an airplane. According to Nana-lore, he pointed up in the sky and said, "Nana, I'm going to fly one of those some day." Which, as most of you know, he did. ;-) We're all going to miss her so much.