Picture yourself at 102 years old, blind and living at Maeford Place.
Irene was recommended to me by a friend as a good person to share her story because she still has a good memory and a great sense of humour.
I found this was true when we met on Oct. 27 in her comfortable apartment.
Irene was born February 1915 in Glasgow, Scotland at the end of the First World War. Her parents gave life to Irene, her four sisters and two brothers. She is the only surviving member of this family.
Irene learned to walk early in life and it became one of her favourite pastimes but she was also an avid reader – mostly of true stories. She was also an excellent writer.
As Glasgow was a crowded place, the seven children spent much of their time at a park called Whiteinch. They played ball and skipped rope together and Irene became a good athlete and told me she could outrun most of her school pals.
At 14, she and her next oldest sister at only 15 were the first in the family to travel to Canada to settle for a better life. They took the passenger ship Athenia, which was later used by the Navy in the Second World War.
The sisters found lodging in Verdun – a small city outside of Montreal. At first, Irene worked as a message girl and then she washed clothes.
She found the wealthy people mostly lived on Cherbourg Street in Montreal but they were not the kindest of people to their young servants. However, Irene did find a wonderful boss with the unusual name of Lilias Torrence Newton. She was a professional artist who once was called to London, England to paint a portrait of Queen Elizabeth.
Around that time, Irene remembers being in a boarding house where some of the Group of Seven painters lived and she helped to feed them.
When Irene was 24 she found the love of her life and they were married in 1939. His name was William Davies and he was serving in the Merchant Navy at the beginning of the Second World War.
She told me the story of when the ship he was on was bombed and most of the sailors were in the sea. William heard screams issuing from one of his mates nearby and realized he was being eaten by a shark.
A Canadian battle ship came by and was able to rescue William and several others and eventually he and Irene were reunited, and their girls Diane Elizabeth and Maureen Lilias grew up knowing their father until he died in 1989.
Maureen now lives in Quesnel and visits her mother, while Diane is in Texas but unfortunately she has multiple sclerosis and lives in a wheelchair. However she has raised two children, Daniel and Cassandra, while Maureen has a son, Seth, so Irene has been blessed with grandchildren.
We talked about how children are raised these days and Irene feels they are given too much freedom and they have so little hardships in this society, which she feels were what built her character and helped her to live through wartime, poverty and widowhood.
Marian Gillard is a seniors advocate and regular Observer contributor.