As she eyes her 90th birthday coming up in March, Madge Struthers said she is grateful for having a full life this far.
“A friend of mine in her 90s and I were talking and I said, ‘well, you know even if our health is suffering now, we can’t complain, we’ve been able to do so much in our 90 years,” she said. “Some people when they retire can’t do anything. We’ve been lucky that way.”
When asked about the secret to her longevity, she said volunteering is a biggie.
“You meet so many good people and you get a lot of satisfaction out of it,” she said. “It helps other people too. I think volunteering is a wonderful thing.”
For more than 16 years, she has been making the Wednesday special - Denver sandwiches - at the Williams Lake Seniors Activity Centre.
“The lady before me who made them, Donna, passed away from cancer so I inherited the job. She told me to keep the recipe of ham, green onion and celery.”
She admitted trying to add red and green peppers once, but that did not go over well.
“So for 16 years I’ve been making them exactly the same,” she added, chuckling.
Struthers was born in England but has called Williams Lake home since 1971.
Before the lakecity she and her husband lived in Yellowknife for a year.
“It was a culture shock, that’s for sure, but we like it so much we wanted to see what the rest of Canada was like.”
They lived in Kitimat and then spent two years in New Zealand on a working holiday.
“We worked in a forestry lookout, but the forests were planted and you could see the end of every forest. It was like a square,” she recalled, chuckling.
She said her husband was also hired to kill rabbits because they were so prolific.
They returned to Canada and moved to Ontario and then her husband was killed in an accident at the Granisle Mine, near Babine Lake.
Struthers and her husband had adopted two girls so she went back to England with them because she was on her own to see if they wanted to live there.
“But the girls were so used to the open spaces in Canada they didn’t like the smog there, so we came back to Canada and lived in Terrace.”
In Terrace, she met Jim Struthers and married him. The family moved to Williams Lake when he got a job with Pinette and Therrien and stayed working there for the rest of his career.
She and Jim enjoyed square dancing up until 20 years ago when Jim died from cancer.
“I volunteered for the cancer society when it was here for 15 years,” she said.
Her daughters live in Tumbler Ridge and 108 Mile, plus she has four stepchildren and they live all over B.C.
Over the years she had been back to England quite often. Her sister lost her husband a year before Jim passed away.
“She’d come to visit me one year and I’d go and see her the next year.”
Beside being “home,” Struthers said Williams Lake is friendly.
“I have lots of friends here, this is my home.”
Struthers floor-curls and for many years was part of a team that travelled out of town to compete at the Senior Games.
In early February she moved into Glen Arbor on Oliver Street after being on the waiting list for about three or four months.
She enjoys reading on her tablet or bringing books home from the Seniors Activity Centre.
“I also do jigsaw puzzles.”
Struthers has a granddaughter and grandson living in town and likes to spend time with them.
“I’ve got great grandchildren too.”
