Almost 100 - and going strong

The Nugget is often asked to cover an event that brings happiness to residents of the Sisters Country. Last Tuesday was one of those events: a birthday party for Chris Dalton, 99, going on 100.

All you could hear as you walked into the Sisters Community Church hall, where about 60 members of the Central Oregon Council on Aging were assembled, was gales of laughter. Standing out was Chris' lively and joyful voice: "Sweet sixteen, and never been kissed," she was saying to one of her friends.

Looking at that beautiful, gray-headed bundle of energy-who doesn't need glasses or hearing aids-all decked out in a lovely birthday dress with a beautiful corsage of roses, brought smiles to everyone. When someone stopped to tell her how lovely the corsage looked, she'd come out with another joyful one-liner and laugh, "And they smell good, too!"

Just before everyone sat down for a splendid chef's salad lunch, the room erupted in the joyful and familiar birthday tune, "Happy Birthday!" with Chris swaying to the beat of the song, smiling as she gazed at her beautiful birthday cake.

During lunch someone asked the Birthday Girl how many children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren she had, and her response was typical of her spirit of living, but tinged with a moment of quiet as she said, "I had six children, and five still living." Then a pause. But she quickly recovered with a smile and said, "Uummm, I think 14 or 15 grandchildren, and numerous great-grandchildren, I don't know for sure... it's hard to keep count."

Then in her spirit of living her life to the fullest, Chris dropped a George Burns line on everyone with, "I'm an orphan, you know, I don't have a momma or poppa, no siblings, I'm the only one left." When someone asked when her actual birthday was, "April 8," she responded, "that makes me a diamond baby," followed by another giggle, she added, "That's why I sparkle!"

(The celebration was held early because Chris will be heading south for the winter and won't be back before her actual birthday.)

Chris was born in 1913 on the island of Kauai, Hawaii, and was still there when the "Day of Infamy" struck our nation.

"Thank goodness my husband was on patrol across the island," she recalled. "When we saw the planes coming in, we thought it was some kind of an Army exercise, we had no idea they were Japanese bombers headed for Pearl Harbor."

"Did you ever smoke?" one of the people at Chris' tables asked.

"Sure I smoked," she responded, then with that sparkle and grin, she added, "Cigarettes were 15 cents a pack back in those days, but I never learned to inhale."

There are so many things Chris enjoys about life it's difficult to list them, but one is crocheting and the another is bingo. She loves to create dishcloths, pot-holders and stocking caps. During the last rodeo parade in Sisters she was on a rodeo float and many of the people viewing the parade were given snazzy pot-holders Chris crocheted.

And my interview came to end when one of her pals came by her table, grabbed her arm, and shouted, "Come on Chris, bingo has started!" And away she went, like a teenager; while at the next table, just finishing the birthday cake and ice cream, someone said, "Darn! I hate to see her go south for the winter, she's such a grand lady."