At age 105, Florentine “Monty” Johnston said she only felt “about 50 or 60.”
“I feel like I could get up and go,” said Johnston, who lives in Saint John, NB
With her newly combed auburn hair, smart green pantsuit, and pink and white carnation corset, she is livelier than some people half her age.
“I still have my sanity. I’m pretty good in my chair,” she said. “That’s how I stay alive. I’m holding the damn thing.”
At her birthday celebration Friday afternoon at the Chateau de Champlain seniors’ community in Saint John, which included pound cakes and a happy birthday serenade from singing mechanic Danny Joyce, she was in the mood to look back on a life well-lived.
Growing up in Cape Breton in the 1920s and 1930s was “tough,” she said.
“When I was young there was nothing unless you paid for it. When you have six kids in your family and times are tough, you just don’t get everything that’s going.
“But I think I did everything right.”
The woman celebrates a life well-lived with some good advice for the rest of us: “Don’t just sit.”
She graduated from Saint John Vocational School, where she studied shorthand, and began working immediately upon graduation at the age of 17. Her first job was at the New Brunswick Museum, where she typed information about the specimens.
“I couldn’t afford to go to college at the time,” she says. “Things were tough back then.”
She later worked for Irving Oil as a credit card supervisor.
About this nickname…
Her nickname comes from the surname of her first husband, John F. Montague, father of her three children. After his death, she married her second husband, George Johnston.
“I’m still Monty and everyone calls me Monty,” she said. “I don’t know everyone’s name, but everyone knows mine. The others – there’s Anns and Joes and Jims and all that. But Monty’s the only Monty in the room.”
After outliving both her husbands, she traveled the world with the money she put aside — including the summers she spent in Barbados for more than 20 years.
“I went to Ireland and even kissed the Blarney Stone. That’s why I can talk so much.”
“I’m very happy, very satisfied. I enjoy life and I enjoy people. I enjoy cards and I enjoy cribbage,” she said.
Sue Palmer, general manager of Chateau de Champlain, describes Monty as “a character.”
“Monty is a driving force. At 105 today, that’s amazing. She’s still very much on the go, knows what’s going on, knows the days of the week, she reads all the time. I can’t believe she’s 105.”
Bring up the murder mysteries
Monty enjoys following the achievements of her five grandchildren and ten great-grandchildren – and a good crime thriller.
“I just love Sandra Brown. She is an exceptional writer. I have read all of her books.”
Once “a man asked me what I was looking for – a love story? I said get out of here.
Her sense of humor and interest in the people around her has never waned. Up until a few years ago, she was still doing voluntary work for Meals on Wheels and Rocmaura.
“The phone keeps ringing,” she said. “I have friends all over the world.” Her daughter Shawn is “very devoted,” she said, as are her other children.
“When I talk to her about going to Brennan [funeral home]’ She doesn’t want to hear about it. She thinks I’ll live forever, you know. God is good, but he is not that good! You know what I mean?”
What is the best advice she would give after 105 years of life experience?
“Have a glass of rum and water at four in the evening. It’s better than all the pills you can take.”
That — and “be nice to people and don’t think you’re better than everyone else.”
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