Margaret’s Resilience

"I remember the winter of 1950 like it was yesterday. We didn't have the luxuries we have now. No central heating that worked when the power went out, and no way to call for help besides walking to your neighbor's door through waist-high snow."

"I was working at the old Civic Hospital then. We saw a lot of hardship, but we saw a community that refused to break. I remember one night when the ice was so thick the branches looked like glass. The power had been out for three days in the Glebe. In my building, we didn't wait for the city; the men dragged the old wood stove from the basement into the main lobby."

"Every family brought what they had. Someone brought a single bag of coal, another brought a loaf of bread, and I remember old Mr. Henderson bringing his last two logs of maple. We kept the children sleeping in the lobby near that stove for forty-eight hours. We didn't ask what someone's politics were or where they came from; we asked if they were cold or if they were hungry. That is the Ottawa I remember—we were all we had, and that was enough."

"My secret to a long life? It isn't the food or the vitamins. It's the resilience of the spirit. You have to keep your hands busy and your heart open. There is always someone who needs help, and in helping them, you find the strength to help yourself."