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Langley legend turns 104 years of age

For more than three decades she volunteered with the Langley Hospice Society. That taught her to live life to the fullest.
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Langley Lions such as Don Stearns and Paul Keeris hosted the Langley Lions birthday celebration Jan. 19 for Dorscie Paterson. She turned 104 on Jan. 25.

PHOTO: Dorscie Paterson turned 104 on Jan. 25. (Heather Colpitts/Langley Advance)

Langley Lions honoured one of their own when they threw a 104th birthday party for Dorscie Paterson.

Her late husband, David, was a member of the club and Dorscie was a Lady Lion.

“There’s a wonderful life after 100,” she told the crowd gathered in West Langley Hall on Jan. 19.

A recent stint in hospital slowed her down and made her latest mode of transport a wheelchair, but Paterson’s trademark sense of humour was evident at the Lions’ gathering.

She was asked about her life and recounted one of her earliest memories from childhood.

When she was misbehaving, her mother once put her in the coal house in their North Ontario home.

After a few minutes, her mother asked if she was going to behave and little Dorscie answered yes.

“Then when she wasn’t looking, I spit on all her dresses,” she said. “I’m sorry about that.”

Paterson remembers her first day of school. That would have been around 1918.

“I was in a lovely blue dress and I behaved very well,” she said.

And her first job?

“My first job was getting an education,” Paterson noted.

She said she came from a close-knit family with “strong, strong women.”

Paterson, herself, has been considered a dynamo around this community for many years.

It was through the Lady Lions that she met Jeannine McCarthy, who pulled together the support for a hospice society.

The group started up on a shoe-string, borrowing $50 from the Lady Lions for stamps and a phone line to get started.

The members went to seminars or courses and learned about the grieving process and the end of life.

Paterson volunteered with hospice for more than three decades until well over 100.

She encouraged other people to volunteer and stay active in life.

“When you’ve been 30 years at palliative care, you know that life is coming to an end,” she told the Langley Advance back when she turned 102. “You must take hold, and grab it, and use it.”

She’s still in Beta Sigma Phi Langley, the local chapter of the international women’s friendship network.

The chapter chose her at its First Lady of Langley in 2006, an honour given out by the group to someone outstanding in the community.

Paterson so enjoyed the women she met that she joined.

Paterson was born the same year the first crossword puzzle was published in a newspaper, the year Henry Ford started his automobile assembly line and the year prizes started to be put into Cracker Jack boxes.

What’s the most profound event of her memory? The Second World War.

She said life stopped for those years.

“There was a time when the world at war and our young men didn’t come back,” she said.

After the war, everything changed.

“The memories started, everything started, life started,” she said.

PHOTO: Lion Don Stearns chatted with Dorscie Paterson at the Langley Lions birthday celebration Jan. 19. She turned 104 on Jan. 25. (Heather Colpitts/Langley Advance)



Heather Colpitts

About the Author: Heather Colpitts

Since starting in the news industry in 1992, my passion for sharing stories has taken me around Western Canada.
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