That's Elsie Allcock that is. She is 105 years old. I stumbled across her story on the BBC News site where they sometimes squeeze in feel good human tales.to counterbalance all the usual gloom and doom that news services are obliged to pump out.
Being 105 is not in itself a huge deal any more. What is special about Elsie is that she was born in the very same house where she still resides in the former coal mining village of Huthwaite in Nottinghamshire. Her two-bedroomed house on Barker Street is pretty humble. It's the one right next to the white house...
So many people live restless lives of aspiration - wanting more than they have got. However, that was never the case with Elsie Allcock. She had everything she could ever want in her little house in a back street of a very ordinary post-industrial village in the middle of England. As she said in a different video. "Why should I move somewhere else? I have always been happy here."
Perhaps there's a lesson there for all of us.
I acquired the video below from the BBC News website and I have a feeling that it might not work for aliens living in foreign lands like America, Canada, Australia, Germany and The Isle of Man. If that turns out to be the case, let me know and I'll replace it with a different video about Elsie that aliens can access.
She is just plain joy. I love this story!
ReplyDeleteIsn't that what we all want - contentment?
DeleteI think I'd echo Elsie: "105 years. Yeah."
ReplyDeleteI thought you were considerably younger than that Bruce!
Delete🤣😁😆
DeleteI think people find her fascinating because it's what we all want, our wits about us and to be able to care for ourselves as we age, in place.
ReplyDeleteThe best dream of all... along with jigsaws and wordsearches.
DeleteI feel privileged to be reading about Elsie and her village of Huthwaite.
ReplyDeleteThe middle of England as you say.
We know about Elsie thanks to the BBC News website.
The Sun is intent on destroying the BBC because Rupert Murdoch
wants to replace the BBC with a private agency.
There is nothing like the BBC anywhere in the world which is why Murdoch
hates it.
Australia and New Zealand both have tax payer funded national broadcasters and while the funding system is different to the BBC with its licence fee, the end result are similar with independent broadcasting free of the taint of commerce and direct government control, which must follow their respective charters. None are without problems, as the BBC isn't but the model must be fiercely protected. Murdoch media here piles on to our ABC constantly, and we all know why.
DeleteI wish Rupert Murdoch would die. He has been influential in a bad way for far too long.
DeleteThe clip works fine here. It is quite sweet, in a nice way. I often wonder why very rich people work so hard to become even richer. Can they not ever reach a point of contentment.
ReplyDeleteMy thoughts exactly, Andrew.
DeleteI sometimes wonder that too and very rich people often keep working way beyond the normal retirement age. Why?
DeleteThe key here is that she says she's had everything she ever wanted. Her life certainly wasn't uprooted for any reason.
ReplyDeleteContentment is in the head and the heart not in the circumstances of our living.
DeleteThis alien was able to watch the video and is very glad she did. Elsie is a treasure. We could all learn a lesson from her - desire less and be happy with what we have. Simple lives.
ReplyDeleteHang on - you are not an alien! At your core you are English like me.
DeleteI saw your title and wondered how on earth you could write anything about me? because that's my name too. I liked hearing her speak and talking about boiling clothes in the copper and no light if you didn't have a penny for the gas. she's doing well for 105 and I can't imagine still being in the same house I was born in, we moved around so much I don't feel "at home" anywhere. She's right about being happy with what you have though, more of us should take that to heart.
ReplyDeleteI like the name Elsie. Maybe it will come back into fashion. I will suggest it to my daughter who has a 50/50 chance of having another daughter in October.
DeleteIt's popping up all over here in Australia, not top of the list at all, but several young Elsies have been born in the last 20 years.
DeleteHow wonderful, and what a fantastic person Elsie is, she's achieved something that most of us can only dream of.
ReplyDeleteMost of us are restless and live with a background sense of disappointment - always wanting something more.
DeleteEven as an Alien, I am able to watch Elsie‘s video.
ReplyDeleteMy aspirations never went towards being rich, famous and/or powerful, either. I love my home and my hometown, and feel blessed for never having been forced to leave it because of war, hunger or desaster. And to top it all, I have THREE places where I feel at home, and three families who love me! It all seems very unfair, and unmerited, but I am truly grateful for all of it.
My biggest wishes for my personal future are to retain my ability to walk, and what eyesight I have.
I am glad you picked up on the word "alien". I put it in for cheeky amusement. In some ways you sound like Elsie with regard to contentment.
DeleteIt is a quiet end to her life, serenity and contentment. She comes from a past that was familiar to this way of living.
ReplyDeleteA simple woman, she did not ask for much or expect it. She was a baby in that house when World War I ended and she lived in it throughout World War II.
DeleteContentment comes from an active spirituality, I think. (and I don't mean it has to be of a Christian bent) That would make Elsie a guru, kinda like the Dalai Lama.
ReplyDeleteThanks for showing us this, I want to know all about the house, how it has changed and been adapted over 100 years
You could write to Elsie Allcock at 14 Barker Street, Huthwaite, Nottinghamshire, England.
DeleteI have lived in 12 homes - I finally feel at home.
ReplyDeleteI think the older generation are content with much less. In their youth there were no benefits or hand-outs yet they thrived and were content neverthless. When I volunteer at foodbank, there are queues of young women with nails they have paid £30 or more to be painted at a salon when that money could have been spent on food. (Don't get me started.) I have lived in my house for 35 years by the way, but a long way off 105!!
ReplyDeleteWhat a lovely lady! My oldest grandchild is 18 today and I worry so about what the future will bring them!
ReplyDeleteToo many people taking too much. If you buy this house/car/holiday, eat this food, or do this activity, then you are this kind of person.
ReplyDeleteMining people are remarkable people like Elsie is.
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing that wonderful clip. Elsie is an inspiration for how to live a happy life. I'll send her a card today from NZ.
ReplyDeleteYou might enjoy a TVNZ clip on U tube "Kawakawa Gold" which features another mother and son James and Isey. Isey was born in 1919 and their life together is captured in a uniquely NZ film as she approached her 100th birthday.
Sorry for just enjoying your posts and not replying.... busy Grannie days with Lottie whose baby sister or brother is due this week.