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Community Corner

Philadelphia Centenarian Shares Positive Outlook on Life

Less than 1 percent of Americans live to be 100. For Florence Fells, who turned 101 on Sept. 4, it’s a blessing and an accomplishment.

Fells, of Spring Garden, is an active lady who enjoys games, music and the outdoors. She takes part in Homelink’s Adult Day Center, where she loves to play card games like Uno and Skip-Bo, and enjoys spiritual endeavors.

Fells is an African American woman, born and raised in Raleigh, N.C.  She has outlived two husbands and a daughter.

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According to a recent study done by the Pew Research Center’s Religion and Public Life Project, blacks and Hispanics are statistically more likely than whites to live to be 100. They also tend to look more favorably on the idea of longer life spans as a positive development, the study reported.

The average life span for Americans today is 78.7 years, and according to the Pew study findings, most Americans, 69 percent, hope to live for between 79 and 100 years. The number falls off dramatically after that, with only 9 percent wanting to live beyond 100.

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Lori Shmukler, president and owner of Homelink said she admires Fell’s love for life, and her willingness and interest in trying new things, versus slowing down. Homelink offers Fells and other area seniors a variety of recreational activities, as well as health and social services.

“Homelink demonstrates that age does not limit a person’s ability to participate,” Shmukler said. “[We] take pride in giving people the opportunity to experience and explore new things.”

Dan Schiavo, Homelink’s director of activities, said Fells still knows how to ‘cut a rug.’

“She’s very pleasant and she’s still able to dance,” he said. “As a matter of fact we had a luau in August, and she was dancing away.”

 

Schiavo said that sadly many elderly become forgotten, so he makes a point to improve Homelink participants’ overall quality of life.

“Your environment is everything, and I really like to see the transformation of our participants from their arrival to their integration into the Homelink culture, of actually wanting to be active,” Schiavo said.  

At the end of each month, Homelink organizes a birthday celebration for all of the Homelink participants whose birthdays fall within that month. At the end of September, Shmukler said, a special party is planned to honor Fells’ 101st birthday as well as other members of the Center.

Asked what she would do with another 100 years, Fells says she is grateful for every day, and will keep moving forward.

“I would just accept it and keep on going,” Fells said. “God has been good to me.”

 

About Homelink, Inc.

For over 25 years, Homelink, Inc., has provided services for older adults throughout the Greater Philadelphia area, including its Adult Day Center currently serving 80 older adults, a Meals on Wheels program, personal emergency-response systems and consumer and caregiver information and referral. 

Older adults who enroll in the Adult Day Center do so because they have difficulty managing everyday activities on their own. The focus is on recreation and leisure, and programs are designed to restore, strengthen and maintain their well being, and are offered in both English and Spanish. Nursing care is offered to optimize the overall health and safety of participants, and to educate and support caregivers.  Other health services are provided on site including foot and eye care, physical and occupational therapy, lab work and diagnostic testing.

Across all its services, Homelink assists more than 1,000 older adults every day, helping to make it easier and safer to manage at home. 

For more information about Homelink, its programs, or Florence Fells, please call 267-682-1020 or visit www.homelinkinc.org.

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