RECORD STORE TALES #1198: Happy 101st Birthday to Doris Anne Winter

One year ago today, we wished my Grandma Dolly a happy 100th birthday.  She was visited by friends, and family from afar.  She enjoyed cake and balloons.  She legitimately had a good time.  She actually had two parties:  One for friends and neighbors and one just for close family and friends.  She was exhausted by the end of it.  Heck I’d be exhausted if I celebrated my birthday over two consecutive days, and I’m half her age.

Grandma is still with us today despite the odds, and will be celebrating 101 years.  She doesn’t look the same anymore.  The last six months have taken a toll as she has battled time and illness.  Something in her just refuses to give in.  Back in January, I did a special show with John Clauser as a tribute to my grandma, thinking we’d be losing her imminently.  Now it is July.

Today she will just have a few visitors.  There won’t be a lot of celebrating happening.  She’s just too tired and weak.  But she did truck on for another year, hitting another milestone.  101 years.  Imagine being there for the roaring twenties, the dirty thirties, the Second World War and the baby boom.  Picture living through the rapid advances of the 1950s amd 1960s, when television became the norm and Grandpa worked for Bell telephone, connecting all the neighbours with the latest technology for communication.  Grandchildren arrived in the 1970s amd 1980s, and Grandma had a whole new adventure ahead of her, spoiling us.  For us, when we were kids, being babysat by Grandma was a treat.  She’d let us eat Rice Crispies with lots of sugar.

All this and more.  Living through the 1990s when her Grandson learned to drive, and started taking her out on weekends.  She’d make dinner for me every Thursday night when I was at school doing night classes.  Anthropology 101.  I loved that class.  I would arrive stuffed full of her famous pork chops in mushroom soup.  Onto a new millennium, and finally a global pandemic that closed her in as we tried to keep her safe.  She survived two bouts with Covid.  Imagine that.

I’m really proud of my Grandma for hanging on as hard as she has.  We thought she was gone many times over the past three or four years.  I brag about her a lot.  A 100 year old is a rare thing, but a 101 year old is even more so.  It doesn’t look like an easy existence, being 101 years old, but she lives for our visits.  They are the highlight of her week.  Fortunately she has lots of visitors.  My mom goes to see her several days a week and she has friends visiting on the other days.  Where she used to babysit me, now when I visit I sort of babysit her.  She asks for the TV to be changed to the baseball game, or she asks for me to find her glasses.  She can’t see very well anymore, but she likes the sound of the TV.  She still loves her Blue Jays.

You never know what to expect when you go and visit Grandma these days, but I hope she has a good day today.

Happy birthday Grandma.  We all love you.  We just want you to have a nice day today, and we’ll see you very soon.

Mike