Forestburg woman enjoys very special visit

Alaire Oberg, a resident of the Big Knife Villa in Forestburg, enjoyed a visit from a group of friends on Mother’s Day.

They presented Oberg with a red rose, and her 40-year pin in recognition of her membership in The Delta Kappa Gamma Society International since 1972.

Randy Howell entertained on his guitar and Oberg played two favourite songs on the piano for her guests, ‘I Love Those Dear Hearts,’ and ‘You are My Sunshine.’

Oberg was born on a farm. At Easter time, when she was six years old, she started school. As she already knew how to read and write, she was soon promoted to Grade 3.

Her love of music came early and her mother’s piano was much played, with Oberg passing her Toronto Conservatory Music exams and teaching piano.

Her greatest aspiration was to go to Toronto when she graduated, but in those days she was considered too young to be away from home. However, in 1944, Oberg and a girlfriend went to Edmonton, where they both worked at a Canteen on Kingsway.

Oberg began to think about education as a career, and she studied in Calgary.

She taught in her first school close to Alliance. She boarded with a family there and her mother would come and get her on weekends.

Floyd Oberg, a local boy, and Alaire married in 1952, and he was transferred two years later to Edmonton in Grain marketing, and then to Winnipeg.

Back in Edmonton, she taught in Queen Mary Park with Anne Carmichael as her mentor.

Mike Strembitsky offered her a principal-ship at Clara Tyner, where parental support was great.

Oberg moved to Central Office as a consultant and then to Aldergrove.

In 1984, she retired to live with her mother on the family farm.

After her mom passed, she spent nearly five years by herself, renting the land out and spending time landscaping her yard.

One day, an unusual feeling came over her… she passed out on the back steps of the house. She was put on STARS and flown to Edmonton. Oberg maintains everything about that incident remains a blank.

Eventually, she sold the farm and before too long, found she needed to part with a lot of precious things, missing the things that had meant a lot to her. Her cherished items, therefore, she releases gradually.

Wisely, she states: “There’s never a right time.”