Mauricette Elaine Ball (Bontemps)

Mauricette Elaine Ball (Bontemps), 84, of Cuba passed away peacefully at 2:15 p.m. Tuesday, October 30, 2018 in the comfort of her home, with her loving children by her side.

Mauricette was born February 15, 1934 in La Rochelle, France to Roger Jean Francois Bontemps and Lucienne Marie Fernande Percot of Lagord, France.

Mauricette met and married Donald Lee Ball in La Rochelle, France. With barely a command of the English language immigrated to America in 1959.

As a devoted and loving wife, mother, grandmother, and great grandmother, Mauricette cherished her family above all. Her marriage to Donald flourished, together they built an upstanding family. Donald passed in January 2015. What God has kept together for over 57 years, he shall keep together for all eternity.

Mauricette, known as Marci to her friends, served her community as a cook at Cuba Elementary School, a housekeeper and caregiver for the elderly, and a self-taught beautician. During the fall harvest she picked apples at Gilliam's Pleasant Row Orchard in Cuba for 17 years. She enjoyed knitting and crocheting blankets and scarves for her grandchildren.

She is survived by four children, Patrick (Lori) Ball of Vista, CA, Ronald (Anita) Ball and Rodger (Julie Foster) both from Cuba, and Michele (Harold Smith) of Canton; seven grandchildren, seven great grandchildren, one step great grandson, and one younger brother, Jean Paul Bontemps of Lagord, France.

Services will be Saturday, November 3, 2018 11:00 a.m. Sedgwick Funeral Homes in Canton, IL. Rev. Kevin Van Tine will officiate.

Comments

Back to School (Without the Triple Lindy)

I hadn’t set foot inside a public library in over thirty years. Last Saturday, when I walked through the sliding doors of the modern County of San Diego branch on Eucalyptus Avenue in Vista, my eyes instinctively scanned the floor for the familiar, comforting sight of varnished oak cabinets and brass pull-handles. Nothing . No card catalog. No little wooden drawers. No rows of index cards typed by someone who presumably had beautiful penmanship and a pension. I walked up to the front desk, looked the librarian dead in the eye, and asked with complete earnestness: "Where’s the card catalog?" She didn’t laugh, though she had every right to. Instead, she offered a warm, dry smile: "We magically had the computer digest it." And just like that, I was enrolled. Not the Rodney Dangerfield kind of back-to-school. No diving board, no loud blazer, no campus party, and thankfully, no need to convince anyone I belonged there. Just an overdue reminder that while I was busy with ...

Beyond Facts-The Deep Dive

✨ In this episode, Beyond Facts: Reimagining School–in the Age of AI . . . This week's podcast is a bit different; it's another example of how Artificial Intelligence (AI) can offer tools to creatively enhance your analytical presentation of information. We took this week's blog and copied it into Gemini with the question, “If a story is to work, it must, on some level, create an illusion of escape and also achieve a goal simultaneously. Does this apply to my blog post that follows?” What's created is not just an analysis of the writing, but an AI-generated discussion produced “On the Fly” - Enjoy! Did you know that the word "school" comes from the ancient Greek word scholē , which originally meant "leisure"? Not a rigid schedule or droning lectures filled with "facts," but free time for thinking and conversation. To the Greeks, learning happened best when life slowed down—when you had room to reflect, to ask questions, and to wrestle ...

Doc Welch - The Country Doctor

In this episode, Doc Welch . . . Many authors have characterized life in rural Illinois over the years. Among the more notables are Edgar Lee Masters, who wrote Spoon River Anthology, Carl Sandburg for his poetry and biography of Abraham Lincoln, and little known to me until recently, my first doctor, whom everyone in town always called Doc Welch - James K. Welch, M.D. (Feb. 7, 1915, to May 5, 1998) While exploring the microfilm of the Cuba Journal (published from 1884 to 1992), I consistently kept running across articles entitled The Country Doctor. This intrigued me. Doc Welch was a third-generation practicing Country Doctor in Cuba for over 40 years. His father, James William Welch, M.D., practiced medicine in Cuba for more than five decades. His grandfather, James Knox Welch, M.D., settled in Cuba after the Civil War. Cuba, Illinois, is a small, rural farming community in west-central Illinois, where I grew up. Like many small towns, it boasts a central square with a ban...

The Rhythm of the Woodpecker

The morning in Vista often begins under a heavy, gray marine layer that rolls in from the coast, pressing a damp, muffled stillness over the neighborhood. At 4:30 a.m., the driveways are still full. The local commuters are either blissfully unconscious or stumbling blindly toward their showers, clinging desperately to their last shred of peace before the nine-to-five grind claims them for the day. I, on the other hand, am voluntarily wide awake in the dark. When your agenda consists of absolutely nothing, it is critical to get an early start. Inside the house, the quiet is profound, broken only by the sharp, mechanical click of the kettle as it reaches a rolling boil. I stand at the counter, watching the dark ground coffee bloom as hot water hits the French press's stainless steel. The smell is sudden and heavy—a deep, roasted-earth aroma that cuts through the morning fog. I push against the plunger’s gritty resistance, pouring a cup that radiates dark, stinging heat against my pal...

On The Fly

Search This Blog