The Ron Greenwald Show

Ep. 43 Pearl Fletcher: Embracing the Joys of Aging and the Secrets to a Positive, Fulfilling Life

• Ron Greenwald • Episode 43

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As I sat down with the delightful Pearl, an 85-year-young dynamo, her eyes sparkled with the same zest for life that would put any youngster to shame. Our conversation, a kaleidoscope of her life's vibrant hues, sweeps us from the innocence of childhood dress-up to her 64-year symphony of love with her husband, Bob, offering a treasure trove of wisdom on flourishing in the autumn of life.

Pearl, with her infectious laughter, narrates the tale of her and Bob's journey from the Canadian chill to California's embrace, weaving in tales from her nursing days to Bob's chiropractic escapades. We uncover the secrets of maintaining joy as we age, the camaraderie in senior living communities, and the resilience that shone through during the pandemic's trials. If you're seeking inspiration to fuel a happy, active life regardless of the passing years, let Pearl's unwavering positivity and proactive spirit guide your way.

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Greenwald Realty Team
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Ron Greenwald:

Welcome in. This is Ron Greenwald, the Ron Greenwald Podcast, and this show serves as a lightning rod for older adults in their journeys to a happy and successful lifestyle. We talk, we bring in professionals, we bring in older adults, we bring in all those people that can bring benefits of great stories and great knowledge to help older adults as they navigate their journey. So we also invite the children and the grandchildren of those older adults, too, to listen to this, to help and understand the journey of aging. And today I am thrilled to introduce my guest who we just met about a couple months ago, and I said immediately you must come on and do a podcast with me, pearl. Welcome to the Ron Greenwald podcast. Welcome in, it's great to have you here.

Pearl Fletcher:

Thank you, ron. It is just a pleasure to be here. I am so happy to be here with you again. We had such a fun time last time and I look forward to a fun time this time too.

Ron Greenwald:

Thank you, and you look fabulous. The first thing you said to me is that you love glitz. And how did all that come about?

Pearl Fletcher:

Well, I like to dress up as a young child. About Well, I like to dress up as a young child and that was fun in my mother's wedding dress, which was overwhelmingly large on me. But the older I get, the more glitz I get and I just let it go at this point because it's fun to do, that's all. It's just fun. It makes me happy to do. That's, that's all. It's just fun. It makes me happy and that is a big thing in my life. That's my responsibility to make myself happy well, that's awesome.

Ron Greenwald:

Tell us a little bit about yourself. You, you're welcome. You're willing to give your age to the world, to this part, oh you can all know my age.

Pearl Fletcher:

I'm going to be 85 in June, the end of June this year, and what a blessing it is. I remember when my dad turned 70, he said I said, oh my goodness, you're getting old. And he said, Pearl, there are lots of people who don't live to be 70. Look at how lucky I am. So I never planned on getting to be 85. I thought I'd die young, but aren't I lucky I'm here.

Ron Greenwald:

And you're married to Bob. I'm married to Bob and you're celebrating your. What number anniversary.

Pearl Fletcher:

It's going to be our 64th anniversary, and that is a joy, because lots of people don't stay married 64 days and here we are 64 years, ron.

Ron Greenwald:

And tell us a little bit about the family.

Pearl Fletcher:

We have three children. We have two girls and then a son. One daughter lives in Carlsbad, One lives in Tennessee and our son lives in Dallas, Texas.

Ron Greenwald:

So they're scattered around.

Pearl Fletcher:

They are scattered around, but only the last two and a half years. Until then we all lived up to. Our one daughter has lived in San Diego for probably 30 years and our other daughter and son they lived right in Thousand Oak West Lake, moorpark area.

Ron Greenwald:

Which, for those that don't know, is kind of a northern of Los Angeles.

Pearl Fletcher:

It's about an hour north of Los Angeles, you're right.

Ron Greenwald:

Bob, so is that what you said? Most of your life is in the Los Angeles area.

Pearl Fletcher:

Well, the last, probably 30 years of it? Yes, that has been in that area.

Ron Greenwald:

And what did Bob do for a career?

Pearl Fletcher:

Well, we were born both of us in Canada and I met Bob when I was in nursing, in training, and he was in the hospital, he worked in the department where they take care of the money, and we went out a couple times and then he said to me you know, you're a nice girl. But he said I want you to know right away, when I get married I will have one or two children, and then I am moving to California. You see, he had been out here on a trip when he was 18 and loved California, but the United States had a draft, we Canada did not. So he wanted to avoid the draft and he said so, pearl, if that sounds good to you, we can continue dating. If not, well, maybe we can be friends. So we did continue dating and from there we got married, and it was a couple years later because I was still in nursing and then we had a child and, due to his predictions, then we moved to California.

Ron Greenwald:

And did you continue being a nurse?

Pearl Fletcher:

I did do nursing for quite a while. That was a passion of mine. I loved nursing. To this day I love nursing. But he decided then he would.

Pearl Fletcher:

We had two more children in California and after the third one was born, was born in November, in December he came home one day and he said to me he was due to go out and his friend and he had set up a whole I don't know thing for doctors in their offices for collecting money and everything. And when he came home from seeing one of the doctors I said to him how did it go? And he wasn't telling me about how this business of his or future business was going to go. He started telling me about how he could go back to school and he could become a chiropractor. That was total news to me and that long ago chiropractic wasn't looked upon with a lot of oh, wow, isn't this wonderful? And so I said well, how is that going to work, bob? He had a wonderful job at Getty Oil Company. He was corporate accountant for Getty Oil. I thought if we ever make any money near close to this, how are we going to live, bob? Was this a?

Ron Greenwald:

midlife crisis for Bob.

Pearl Fletcher:

Well, I thought it was a midlife crisis for me.

Ron Greenwald:

He's not here, so he can't answer.

Pearl Fletcher:

For me it was. But I said how is this going to work? Well, he said you know, I've got it all figured out, pearl. He said I can go to school, I can go to work at Getty, I can leave the house at 7.30 in the morning, I'll go to Getty, I'll work till 5. Then I can go over to school after that, and I'll be home by 11.30 at night. And I thought how is this going to work? And I said, bob, how long does this take? Well, I'll be done in three years. And I thought I will do it too.

Pearl Fletcher:

But you know, if I didn't say yes to that, I might have regretted it for a long time, or I might have regretted it for a long time, or I might have heard about it. And I thought, I guess he thinks he has to do this. And it was a real embarrassment for me because I didn't and he had never done anything that he wouldn't complete. We were into is this a good thing? Is it workable and doable? So I said, yes, go ahead. And so we did that and after a good year and a half I realized it was going to, we were going to finish it. In the beginning I didn't have a lot of faith that that could be finished with three kids, but you supported him.

Pearl Fletcher:

But yes, yes, I did.

Ron Greenwald:

I think you should be a marriage counselor for the younger generation today in terms of how to support one another.

Pearl Fletcher:

Well, anyway, it did work out for us. He had an extremely successful practice. And then he came home one day and he said I had the best news today. Okay, bob, what's the news? Oh, he said, one of my patients, you know, he's in real estate and he found a residential care facility that we can buy. And I said well, why can we buy that, bob? Well, the real reason is it's going under Pearl, these people. They just redid the whole thing. Everything's been redone, it's beautiful, but they don't have the money. They didn't have enough backing. They've only had it six months. They thought they'd be rolling in money in six months.

Ron Greenwald:

So Is this in Los Angeles?

Pearl Fletcher:

This was in Thousand Oaks.

Ron Greenwald:

Okay.

Pearl Fletcher:

So I said well, I guess you're going to look at this, right? He said oh yes, it'll be a great thing for you, pearl. I know you'll be able to do this and you'll have fun with this.

Ron Greenwald:

Now, what age are your children at this point? Were they having the second?

Pearl Fletcher:

Well, they were probably the oldest, one would have been maybe 10.

Ron Greenwald:

Oh.

Pearl Fletcher:

And so the youngest would have been about six, and this was in Thousand Oaks and at that time we lived in Chatsworth, which was quite a drive. Nonetheless, we did buy that facility. It had 109 beds and we kept the lady on for one year so I could learn how to run a residential care facility. So that was a new experience and I did that full time for probably about two and a half years and then we got directors. After that I stayed very involved with it that if they ever went on vacation or had sick days, I would always go in and replace them and I would go in every week regardless, because that was my baby checking up on it checking up on all of my residents and my staff so you're managing an owner of a residential care community up in the Thousand Oaks area.

Ron Greenwald:

Your children are still weaving their way through teenagerhood and going on to college, so part of our mission of this podcast is how to fast forward a little bit. You are moving, you moved it, so you sell that at some point in time and move to san diego, is that?

Pearl Fletcher:

right. We sold that. We owned it for 25 years. I was 35 when we bought. True, we decided we would move.

Pearl Fletcher:

Because my, our daughter decided she wanted to move to out of state, to where her sons could afford to live in. There If they got married and had a wife and children, they could have homes and the wife could make a decision Did she want to stay home or did she want to work. So she decided they would go to Tennessee and we would go to Tennessee. So we had the moving people come. They came and they went through the house and said this is the size van you're going to need, and that was fine. Then, when they came to do the move, they brought the van different young man again and he came to me and he said your house is not going to fit in this van. Well, why won't it? That's what they told me. No, he said I don't care what they told you, it's not going to work.

Pearl Fletcher:

So I called my daughter apart and I said Grace Ann, this is not going to work. Oh, she said what can we do? I said there's nothing we can do, except what we're going to do. You are going to come with me, we're going to walk through the house, make a decision what we don't need, and then you're going to take the boys and they're going to move it all outside onto the driveway, parts of it at a time, and you're going to take videos and this was her decision. I'll take videos of it and we'll put it up free. Everybody will come, it'll be gone and every half hour I'll go out. And then if it's gone which I think it will be bob she said, then we'll put more stuff out and I'll check every half hour. So we got sterling silver, went out and you were willing to part with all that.

Pearl Fletcher:

You know know it was a decision that had to be made. The kids did not want Sterling Silver. They didn't want the work involved in it and there was no time to call friends and say, would you like this Sterling? Maybe their kids didn't want it either.

Ron Greenwald:

That's a story unto itself. I mean, as I say, having worked with hundreds, if not thousands, of people moving to, you know, senior communities or down right sizing. That is a story I haven't heard yet.

Pearl Fletcher:

So bless you, pearl then the grand piano went out on the there, because that's another big piece you moved the grand piano outside outside. The boys did. We had three young strapping boys. They got it outside.

Ron Greenwald:

And you were giving that away for free.

Pearl Fletcher:

For free. Everything that went outside went outside for free. The people learned they didn't leave. Grace Ann was telling. I never went outside and looked at it. I thought what's going is going. But she said the cars and the vans and the trucks were staying because they knew stuff would be coming and so all kinds of stuff went out till finally they said okay. I said now is that enough stuff that's gone, can you do this now? And when they said yes, then that was yes, yes. But the story gets funnier.

Ron Greenwald:

We're still not in San Diego, we're still going to Tennessee. At this point, we're still going to Tennessee.

Pearl Fletcher:

So all of the furniture then gets put in the vans and then they come for the cars, because cars go on the moving vans, on those car loaders too, and all of the cars go. I think there were five of them that went. And I said to Grace Ann she knew ahead of time I had told her your dad and I are going to go down to San Diego. We're going to stay in San Diego for one week. We're going to take each of us a small suitcase that will hold only enough clothes for the week. We'll stay with Diane so we have some time with her. That was wonderful. So we came down here and we stayed with Diane Diane's your other daughter.

Pearl Fletcher:

She's our other daughter. She's in Carlsbad. And then the second last day we were here, she took us to Westmont facility, which is a retirement facility, for you can get help or you are self-care there. It's a wonderful, wonderful community and before we knew it we were signed up to stay at Westmont and we'd be close to our daughter, diane, who desperately wanted us to stay here. But now all of our clothes oh are in Tennessee and all of our cars were in Tennessee.

Pearl Fletcher:

But you know, for a woman isn't that wonderful. I can go shopping and I can buy.

Ron Greenwald:

It's like lost luggage on an airplane, it is, it is.

Pearl Fletcher:

And I told him, I said you know, I am not shipping it back again, bob, we're going to go and we're going to buy whatever we need and I'm going to buy all the clothes. And he, he, I told him, I said, and you're going to be very generous? And that's what he was, and that's what I did.

Ron Greenwald:

Oh my gosh. So did the clothes in Tennessee ever make it back? No, they're just off the good wheel.

Pearl Fletcher:

I go there twice a year usually for about four weeks each time At least. I go twice a year, and then I have plenty of clothes when I'm there. Oh, my goodness, gracious yeah.

Ron Greenwald:

So okay, so that was what two years ago.

Pearl Fletcher:

That was about two and a half years ago.

Ron Greenwald:

And you come to San Diego and you just so how did the conversation? Westmont is a Westmont Encinitas senior community is pretty new at that point.

Pearl Fletcher:

It was brand new. It was opened in July and this we were here the middle of December and took occupancy the first part of October, so it was very new.

Ron Greenwald:

And so the conversation with Bob and the family is going yeah, we don't really want to deal with a house. I mean, what is the conversation to go? Hey, this is a much better lifestyle for us. Well, you have the background in senior living already so you know that part of it. So it wasn't a foreign object to you in any capacity.

Pearl Fletcher:

No, not at all.

Ron Greenwald:

So um.

Pearl Fletcher:

Can I?

Ron Greenwald:

pause really quick. What is that the alarm?

Pearl Fletcher:

Well, that gives you a ten minute.

Ron Greenwald:

Well, that is a story.

Pearl Fletcher:

Isn't that so great, ron. When I heard that, I was like what?

Ron Greenwald:

That you threw everything at me because nobody does that.

Pearl Fletcher:

No, I just love your flow with life and as things happen and you just go okay, then this is here and this is what we do. And then this is here, and then this is what we do.

Ron Greenwald:

Yeah, it's just a new thing, there's no drama or panic, or you know.

Pearl Fletcher:

No, I do not panic.

Ron Greenwald:

Can you tell?

Pearl Fletcher:

me again. I do not panic. I might inside have my pulse rate go faster and think, how are we gonna work this out? Well, don't worry about that, just let right now take care of itself. And Okay, I think we're good to go. Okay.

Ron Greenwald:

Where were we you?

Pearl Fletcher:

were talking about the Westmont community. The Westmont, yeah Right.

Ron Greenwald:

So you come in about two years ago, two, three years ago, and you're with Diane and you wake up one morning and go Bob, maybe we should go up on El Camino Real and go check out this beautiful new senior community called Westmont. Is that the conversation?

Pearl Fletcher:

No, no, no, Diane had gone to see Westmont apparently before we arrived here, oh, okay.

Pearl Fletcher:

And she said you're going to love this, mom. She knew I loved the water, I love the pool. I don't swim but I love to exercise in it. And she said you're going to love this. And she knew the director at that time was Charlie. She knew him and she said we were very fond of Charlie, I think you're going to be happy with him and the apartments are lovely, you will like them, and everything positive she could say to me. She said to me. So one day she said okay, it's coming near the end of the week here, let's go and see them now. And okay, we'll go see them.

Ron Greenwald:

And Bob's on board.

Pearl Fletcher:

Bob doesn't say anything.

Ron Greenwald:

You're, you're, you're okay, Bob is quiet. He's on board. Bob doesn't say anything. You're, you're, you're, you're okay.

Pearl Fletcher:

Bob is quiet. He's in agreement. He's in agreement, we should go see them.

Ron Greenwald:

You gave him the chiropractic side. You're making the senior living side.

Pearl Fletcher:

So we went to see it and it was. The facility was beautiful.

Ron Greenwald:

We'll call it community. We'll say community.

Pearl Fletcher:

The community you're right.

Pearl Fletcher:

You're right. The community was beautiful. The windows are huge, the apartments, the ceilings are high. So, even though they might be smaller a little bit than what you might like to have, and certainly smaller than what you're accustomed to, they look big. And we looked at the bedroom. The bedroom was a very nice size. We thought, oh, they have a nice large closet. The bathroom was very large for the size of the apartment. It was set up beautifully. I couldn't have been happier if somebody had said would you like to run this? I couldn't have been happier if somebody had said would you like to run this? I wouldn't have wanted to run it, but I would have known how to run a place like this and how to fill it up because it was so gorgeous. So before I knew it, bob had signed the lease.

Ron Greenwald:

Oh, he signed it with us. Oh, yes, he signed it, Bob had signed the lease.

Pearl Fletcher:

Oh, he signed it. Oh, yes, he signed it. And Diane was applauding and I was still in a little bit of a shock. Of a shock Because I was thinking, oh, the clothes and the car, well, they have cars here to buy too. We could go and buy a car here, just as well as and you know, we won't worry about that car we have three grandsons. One of them will be happy to have it. So we signed up and I have been very pleased with Westmont.

Ron Greenwald:

I have been thrilled with them. Well, you just glow and you look happy, you look young, you look invigorated.

Pearl Fletcher:

You know that part is my responsibility, the part of being happy. I remember my mother telling me before I was married Pearl, your responsibility for happiness is your own. So, regardless of the situation you are in, you find your own happiness. Bob isn't responsible for that we hope he's going to be responsible for lots of things but your happiness is up to you to find, and so I will always find what makes me happy, and I have truly found. When Sandy goes around and tours people, one of my biggest thrills is to interrupt her tours because I know how difficult it is for a resident coming in to a new community. That's hard for them and I can step in and tell them the wonderful things about Westmont and it gives me the greatest pleasure to see the families relax. Here's someone stepping in that is a resident that will talk to my mom or my dad, or even my wife and myself about the community.

Ron Greenwald:

That is so important. Pearl, as I said, I've been in this space of working with older adults for 15 years and, like we said before we went on air years and like we said before we went on air, most people, most people wait way too long. Then they don't have the capacity to make decisions for themselves, or they live in their home way beyond the time where they should be and the deferred maintenance in the home or things like things that are just really not quality of life right happen.

Ron Greenwald:

Somebody who owned a senior living community such as yourself, understand, understand that. So I just applaud you. I I do want to know who made the call to your daughter in tennessee to say oh, by the way, everything is yours.

Pearl Fletcher:

I think I did I think I did, I think I did, and Bob would have been involved in that also. He would have been involved. She was not happy about it because she had bought a home specifically for us.

Ron Greenwald:

Oh.

Pearl Fletcher:

Specifically, it had no stairs going into the house and it had a master bedroom on the bottom floor. So here she had bought this with us in mind and she had bought I think it's a six-bedroom house, three bath, a big house.

Ron Greenwald:

That had to be a difficult. It was very difficult for her, but you worked through it.

Pearl Fletcher:

But we worked through it. But you worked through it, but we worked through it, we worked through it and we have to work through it. Those are our kids. Those are our kids. And she is not happy that we didn't get to go there with her, but she is happy. She said Mom, I had you for 25 years.

Ron Greenwald:

If Diane needs you now for some time or enjoys having you there, she said, then I have to be happy for Diane well that's a great attitude it is and out of the two two-plus years at Westmont, have you taken on different activities that you did not do before.

Pearl Fletcher:

Well, I never. We had a pool when we lived. Bob had a home built for us.

Pearl Fletcher:

That home had everything in it but it had a huge pool and I loved. I hated to exercise. Okay, outside of the pool. I absolutely hated when the doctor would say can you do this? And they'd show me this, can you do that? They'd show me that, yes, yes, yes, that was the wrong question. The question should be out of the pool, will you do this? Then the answer would have been correct no, I won't do it. I can do it, but I won't do it. But in the pool and Westmont is the only place I know that has a pool. That's indoors. The others are all outdoors. I know in the winter I wouldn't go out and in the summer it's so hot, I don't know this. I stay out. Normally I am in the pool five days a week for an hour and a half to two hours a day just exercising, having a wonderful, wonderful time and you've met new people and made new friends.

Pearl Fletcher:

I've met new people I've met, had made new friends. I did. We did start up a welcoming committee and I was chosen to be the representative for the welcoming committee and I took it for a year but after that I said, no, somebody else needs to take it, we need to have more people know how to run these things. But I loved the welcoming committee. I could go meet the new people and I could tell them all about Westmont and I could just relieve especially on women the anxiety of don't worry, you're just like everybody else, everybody's been nervous. I'm gonna come and'm going to pick you up for meals for probably two days and you're going to be comfortable. The nice part, wonderful part about Westmont is the friendliness of the people. They are extremely friendly. They are the most friendly community I believe I have ever known, except for yours, because your attitude had to permeate that one uh community I believe I have ever known except for years, because your attitude had to had to permeate that one it did.

Pearl Fletcher:

But the good. The sad part was we had covid at that time. The good part of covid and there was we have to find good in everything but the good part was it kept us in the dining room. The whole area had trouble getting employees, so did Westmont. So we'd sit there, sometimes for 20 minutes, half an hour with COVID, before the meals would begin to come, and you'd have grouching and I'd say we are so lucky to have this. We're not in our rooms. Look at, we're out here talking and enjoying other people and that's way more important than being in our rooms.

Ron Greenwald:

Pearl I'm going. The attitude is so important and your attitude of looking for the positive, choosing to be happy, choosing to see the positive. I hope not just older adults listen to this podcast, listen and really hear, because through the last four or five years there's been so much negativity. You can choose to be really, you can choose to be happy, you can choose to have a good attitude, you can choose to live a life that you have chosen to live and you have obviously had ups and downs, twists and turns, Obviously.

Ron Greenwald:

Bob, you put twists and turns in your life and having furniture go to Tennessee and then ending up in San Diego, but you just have come through with such glow. I just want everybody to listen to it, and I hope this is a psychology podcast more than an aging podcast, because you're just a delight to listen to and delight to hear, so I thank you.

Pearl Fletcher:

Thank you for that. But yes, we do have to remember through everything, even through if you have torrential rains, we're going to have a rainbow. Just wait for that rainbow because it's coming and we can have and we will. It's not, we can, we will have disappointments throughout our life, but tomorrow is going to be better than today. But tomorrow is going to be better than today and our choice for happiness and our choice for that is inside of us. I can't expect you to make me happy. I'm happy being here. This is a fun thing for me, but my choice for happiness lies in the dependence upon that is within myself. I have to find things that will make me happy.

Ron Greenwald:

Awesome. I'm going to end it there. I have nothing more to say. This is Ron Greenwald, the Ron Greenwald Podcast. Thank you for tuning in. Thank you, Pearl.

Pearl Fletcher:

My pleasure.

Ron Greenwald:

Thank you for the introduction at Westmont Senior Living Community. Have a great day. This is Ron Greenwald. I thank you for tuning in today to the Ron Greenwald podcast. Please go to greenwaldrealityteamcom, call us, email us with any of your questions or comments. If you're the daughter or son and you're concerned about mom and dad, or you're the aging adult, we have the resources. If you're a professional, an attorney, a wealth manager, a caregiver, we also can provide you resources that may really be that turning point, to provide that senior with the next chapter in their life. That's very positive. I thank you for tuning in Ron Greenwald, the Ron Greenwald Podcast. Thank you.

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