Horns give Irene birthday fanfare
Coronavirus didn’t force the 95th birthday of Neerim South’s Irene Hoare to slip by without fanfare last Wednesday.
That was made sure of by a bit of imagination by the youngest of her three daughters, Dorothy Kerby who was stranded at her home at Hervey Bay in Queensland because of travel restrictions due to the virus.
Unknown to Mrs Hoare, Dorothy who for the past five years had visited for Mothers’ Day and her mother’s birthday a couple of weeks later, arranged for long-time family friend Angus McGillivray to erect a banner at the front of her house just north of Neerim South in the early morning letting everybody that went past know of the birthday.
The “Please Toot Irene is 95 Today” sign certainly did the job.
“Horns never stop blowing – trucks, utes and cars – and the ‘phone never stopped ringing (family and her wide circle of friends)”, Mrs Hoare said.
Adding to the occasion was the arrival of her eldest daughter Annette and her husband from Sunbury, a visit only made possible by the easing in Victoria of intrastate travel last week.
But Mrs Hoare doesn’t think too much about her age; “it’s only a number”, she said.
Claiming to feeing at least 10 years younger than what her birth certificate says, Mrs Hoare said she owed “good luck, a good appetite, good family and good friends” for what has been a very active life.
Originally from West Australia she arrived in Victoria 75 years ago and with husband Aubrey, who died 15 years ago, took up dairy farming at Nayook.
Mrs Hoare was quick – and proud – to state that the family tree now extends to five generations; herself, her daughters, grandchildren, great grandchildren and great great grandchildren.
Three of the great great grandchildren, including a set of twins, arrived within a month last year.
That was an exciting time, she said.
But life hasn’t been all about cows getting milked and raising the family of three girls, Annette, Barbara now at Daisy Hill near Castlemaine and Dorothy.
Adding to the list of things of which Mrs Hoare is proud is that the Neerim District bowling club at Neerim South last year named their womens singles championship trophy in her honour, a fitting acknowledgement of the fact she’d won the title 10 times and been a major contributor to the club in many other ways.
Two hips replacements put an end to the playing side.
She and Aubrey also had the travel bug.
In Australia, with the caravan in tow, Queensland where daughter Dorothy and family lived and West Australia, with Mrs Hoare’s connections there, were tops of the list.
But the couple also made four trips to the United States of America.
Mrs Hoare certainly exudes further pride when she points out “we travelled to all but one of the states in America, the only one missing on the list is Vermont” which ironically she said was the first place they had wanted to visit.
Joining a choir, “Sing Australia”, opened more travel doors for her.
One door opened was a tour early this century when she was in her 80s that took in Turkey, where the choir sung at the Anzac Day dawn service at Gallipoli, and then to the Himalayan mountains when she was in a party of seven, including two others from the Neerim area, that trekked a mountain trail for 24 days.
“Wonderful” was her description of the mountains but she sounded a little embarrassed when adding that a Sherpa carried her bag.
Still regularly busy and keenly interested in her garden and more than ably coping independently Mrs Hoare will continue to live life as full as is possible.
Maybe I’ll get that letter from the Queen, she said.