Happy 100th Birthday to my Gramma Opal

“It takes a long time to become young.” – Pablo Picasso

My grandma Opal Skinner observed her 100^th birthday last week and I surprised her by showing up to help her celebrate. Most of her family, nearly all the residents of her assisted living and many, many, many friends, neighbors and townsfolk ventured out on that windy high-of-4-degrees day in the snow-covered Eastern Colorado Plains to pay their respects and wish her well.

And, what an amazing woman she is! Opal’s mind is still sharp as a tack. She presided over her birthday gathering, sitting tall and proud, next to her 98-year-old sister, Myrtle, who is also still quite spry. An excellent conversationalist, Opal asked pertinent questions about children, health, pets and trips as people she’s known most of her life or only for a short while filed by, offering their cards and hugs, as they laughed, reminisced, snapped photos and enjoyed the punch and cake.

Trouble hearing and an, at times, unsteady gait are the only concessions my grandmother has made to her years. Recently she’s consented to using a walker or resting on someone’s arm as she makes her way through her still activity-filled days. Her eyesight is good and her coordination excellent. She makes wire and bead angels for friends, family and church bazaars. She sews brightly colored bags filled with bird seed to warm in the microwave, then drape on the neck to take aches away. The one badge of aging she’s always wanted – a full head of white hair – continues to elude her. She has so little grey her hairdresser describes her as a brunette.  

Attitude-wise, Opal is opinionated and unfailingly positive. Ask her a question and you’ll get an honest, respectful answer. Opal’s glass is ever half-full, her clouds always silver-lined, and her response to any challenge is to look on the bright side. For the past few years, her answer to the question, “How are you?” has been simply, “I’m blessed.” 
 

I’ve always known my grandmother to be a remarkable person, but when I Googled “how many people live to be 100,” it became obvious just how special she is. Only 0.0173% of Americans live long enough to become centenarians – that is roughly one person in every 6,000. (Fifty years ago, only one in 67,000 reached that mark.)

So, what is the secret to Opal’s long life? There are a few:  

Hard work. She and my grandpa were wheat farmers, starting out as teenaged newlyweds and continuing through their late eighties. They lived off their land, gardened to fill the storm cellar with food, butchered livestock to keep their freezers full, and kept chickens for eggs. My grandparents were up before the sun and, when the season demanded it, worked well into the night.    

I don’t recall seeing my grandma relax much. There was a bit of time after the big farm lunch was cleaned up, before it was time to start dinner that she’d sit on the floor and play games with us. And, on long summer evenings, she’d pull us into her lap and rock gently in the old glider swing that sat on her front porch. We’d watch the birds play in the baths she kept clean and full for them, and enjoy the sweet scent of the red and white pansies she always planted around the house.  

Exercise. An enthusiastic walker and occasional bike rider, Opal always had a “walking buddy” (another farm wife or church friend) she exercised with several times a week.

Opal watched her weight and took pride in her appearance. I don’t think I ever saw her without her hair fixed, her lipstick fresh and, even on the sweatiest of work days, she smelled faintly of perfume. She wore scarves in the wind and aprons to cook and never once did I see her step out of the house “looking like something the cats have been dragging around,” as she described being disheveled.

Regular checkups and promptly dealing with any hint of a health problem were part of Opal’s regimen. She didn’t drink, except maybe a sip of Mogan David wine on holidays. She never smoked and she was a big believer in good clean fun – card games, board games and not too much TV.

Keeping her mind engaged. Opal is an avid reader, who likes listening to informative radio shows. It’s not unusual to get a newspaper clipping or magazine article in a letter she’s written (yes, she still hand writes her own letters) that has to do with something that reminds her of us or that we might be interested in.

Travel. Opal loves seeing the world. I escorted her to a cousin’s wedding in Mexico when she was 90 and I was 45. It was a planes, trains and un-airconditioned busses kind of a trip and I could barely keep up with her. That was when I realized, if I had any of Opal’s genes at all, my life was, indeed, only half over…Even now, she says, “If that van (at the assisted living) is going somewhere, I’m on it!”          

Faith. My grandma reads the Bible daily, attends church regularly, prays, believes and trusts in the Lord. “His will be done,” sums up the way she explains everything that happens – good and bad.    

And, last but never least, family. My grandmother loves her family. Four kids, eight grandkids, 16 great grandkids and three great-great grandkids later, we can still depend on a greeting card from Opal arriving promptly on each of our “special days,” as she calls them.

I don’t know how many years I’ll live, but I hope to live each day with the same understanding of and love for life that my grandma has.  Happy birthday, Opal!