One tough woman

Dorothy Lillian Lauber, Aug 20, 1913 - Feb 3, 2010
My Grandmother.

Always a strong women, she was the mother of three very different boys - all much taller than her. Until a few weeks before her 96th birthday she lived on her own and had never been in ICU. She lived alone in a condo near town for years after my Grandfather passed and then moved into an apartment in one of those retirement communities with different levels of care. Home care and Hospice allowed her to stay in that apartment to the end.

She passed both the vision test and the driving test to renew her drivers license a few years ago then decided on her own the next winter that she was done driving. My Uncles live in town and took her to appointments and shopping and such after that. She was a wonderful quilter and from what I heard very good at bridge. When I was little, she and I would play double solitaire. In the last few month she didn't have the energy to go to the bridge group meetings or the eye sight to do any more quilting though with a bright light she could still read the newspaper.

My Grandmother is the only relative that I have any real family history for. There is a reference to a book Down the Road to Yesterday, A History of Springfield, Annapolis County, Nova Scotia by Mary F. (Fletcher) Kendrick. Published: 1941. Working up the tree: Dorothy (McGrath) married Joseph Lauber and was the daughter of Cora (Durling) and Bernard McGrath. Cora was the daughter of Matilda (McNayr) and George Durling. Matilda was the daughter of William Sucliffe McNayr who was the son of Boyd McNayr. Boyd was born near Glasgow, Scotland in 1778. His father was an officer in the King's Service and planned to move his family from Glasgow, Scotland to Nova Scotia but died at sea when Boyd was about 8 years old. Boyd eventually made it to Nova Scotia and later married Rachel Beal who's ancestry has its own site.

In October I helped my Grandmother clean out the closet and sort through the last of the sewing and quilting books and tools to give away or donate to a fundraiser. I came across a pincushion that I made for her when I was young and the instructions for a quilt she had made for me. I also found her high school and college year books along with a couple of college text books. I got to hear a few more stories of her younger days such as early morning swims in Lake Winnipesaukee. She said she wouldn't need the Christmas cards from the bottom shelf. It turned out she could have sent some but by then even reading was hard and she wouldn't have been able to really sign them, let alone provide a note. It was a long wait at the end. She is at peace at last.

-SML