In August of 1949, Alexandra Susana Williams came into the world as a baby girl.  Now she is my grandmother, and I know her as Gramm.  In her lifetime, she has always lived in Northern California, some of the towns she lived in include Walnut Creek, Concord, Pleasant Hill, Fairfield, Eureka, Oakley, and Antioch.
    As a kid, the only family members she had living with her were her mother and father, and she had no brothers and sisters.  She lived in Walnut Creek, California as a child.  Also, to get to all the places she went, she had to have her parents drive her, just like any other kid.  Her most memorable vacation was going to Disneyland the first month it opened.  At that time, she was five years old.  Her favorite games were Chutes and Ladders, Candyland, and Jaxs.  “I was able to get all the way up to tensies (ten jaxs collected in one bounce of a ball).”  As for pets, she had 4 chinchillas, 2 temple doves, 2 hamsters, 1 duck, 10 dogs (her parents were dog breeders), and 4 cats.  Not all at one time, though.  When she was a kid, she was a little chubby.
    Many interesting experiences came out of her early school years, and we can also learn a lot from these years. When she got old enough, she attended St. Anthony’s school in Oakland. At that school, there were strict nuns, they had to wear uniforms, there were cricket buttons (a cricket button is a button that makes a really annoying sound and makes kids be quiet), and her mom worked in the cafeteria.  One time, when she was practicing on the piano at school with a nun, Gramm hit a wrong note.  Every time she hit a wrong note, the nun would hit Gramm across the fingers.  “It hurt,” she said later in the interview. “Now I have a faded red mark on my hand.”  She was very good in school, and her parents made her skip 4th and 6th grade.  To get to school, she had to have her mom drive her.
    Though her earlier years had many interesting experiences, her teenage years had a lot of interesting experiences, also.  Most of the time for fun, she would “cruise the main”, which means that she and her friends would drive up and down the same strip of road and show off their cars.  As a teenager, she loved to hang out with her friends, going to dances, and visiting the boardwalk.  Gramm liked archery, and like many Californians, loved to go surfing.  “It seems like to live on the West Coast, you have to know how to go surfing,” she said later.  She liked to go “cruising”, put together mosaic tiles, and doing macramé (weaving of fabric).  Her nickname as a teenager was “Gidget”, which means girl-midget.  At that time, the latest fashions were bell-bottoms, Go-Go boots (short boots), and mini-skirts.  Gramm’s teenage years weren’t all fun, though.  When she was 18, she got married.  This marriage was not one of her better ones, and it only lasted about a year.  She was married to Orville Peerson (I know him as Grandpa).  Also in her teenage years, she had my Mother.  When this happened, she was only 19 years old.  Also in her teenage years, she got her first job.  This job was at a restaurant, and she was only in it for an about a week.  “It felt like I was only in it for only 5 minutes!”  Her more permanent job was at Bank of America, which she stayed in for a longer time.
    Like her teen years, her adult years were also happy ones. She had a second marriage, and it was better; it lasted 13 years and she was married to Pete Coffin.  One humorous experience she has had in her lifetime is that she fell down the stairs at the Barnum & Bailey circus.  “I thought that I looked really cool, and then I felt really embarrassed!”  She attended college at the Diablo Valley Collage with a major in journalism and then at Collage of the Redwoods with a major of broadcast journalism.  In her lifetime, some historical events happened.  The first computer came out (Univax), a man walked on the moon, and color TV’s came out.
    Although Gramm’s adult years hold a lot of information; we can also learn a lot from her present years.  Right now, she is member of the Catholic religion.  Currently, she works in Financial Services: Accounting at Hudson Management Company.  Her current family members are her nieces, nephews, my parents, her cats, and of course, me.  She believes that her lifelong accomplishment is that she is happy.  For fun, Gramm likes to go bowling, visiting the coast of California (San Francisco), the movies, visiting Universal Studios, and Disneyland in Southern California. The only activity she has time for is tending to her cats.
    Gramm’s life has been very exciting, and there are some things that I will always remember about her.  I will always remember coming home from school and seeing unexpected packages, talking to her on the phone, and her love for all animals, especially cats.
    I know that my Gramm has a lot more information that I do not know yet. I look forward to being able to extend this biography with more information.