My paternal grandmother was called Angie by everybody, including me. Born in N. France shortly after the turn of the century to working class parents, she became orphaned at an early age and was sent steerage, all alone with a note pinned to her coat, to Chicago to work for an aunt. It was a nightmare Dickensian existence and she soon escaped to live with a poor but loving Irish family, tinging her learned English forever after with a Gaelic lilt. She had three sons; the youngest--a prodigy by all accounts--died at 7 of childhood diabetes, leaving her with a heart that never quite mended.

She made her living as a seamstress, and later further supported her family as an informal florist, both growing and arranging gorgeous boquets for weddings and the like. She made the best pancakes in the world--thin crepes, really--I'm still trying to imitate them. She gave me her time and entire attention whenever I needed it, spent hours telling me stories and playing "let's pretend" with me; she was the only safe adult in my family of origin. I still miss her.

My maternal grandmother was her exact opposite.