81-Year-Old Loves Life
Billie Hughes, 81, of Goodman, says he has enjoyed every bit of his life.
Hughes was born in Oklahoma in 1935 and moved to Kansas in 1942. At age 7 he had polio and had to learn to walk all over again, he said. Crutches were not available and so he used two chairs to support himself.
“I enjoyed my parents. They were fantastic. They were together the whole time,” he said.
After graduating from high school, Hughes joined the U.S. Air Force in 1954. He served for eight years. Following his time in the military, he traveled and worked for the government installing electronics. He believes he has visited every state.
“I may have missed one, but I don’t know which one it was,” he said. He spent most of his civilian
time in Alaska, going from one village to another installing electronics for the government, he added.
He said, “I love traveling. It’s great. I think it’s the best thing a person can do. If I was up to it, I’d do it again.”
Hughes and his wife, Cheryl, had nine children. She died five years ago. Before that, they had a motor home and they were traveling from state to state seeing the sights and doing their genealogy, Hughes said.
Hughes has seen many changes in his lifetime. He remembers the price of gasoline being 10 cents per gallon. He remembers a time before plastic. Medicine has certainly changed since he was a young boy suffering from polio, he observed.
Hughes has had several health problems over the years. In 2001 he had open heart surgery. He has fallen and broken both hips and his back. For the past three years he has been on oxygen. Still, he does not let these setbacks sap his joy.
“I’m enjoying every minute of my life. I’ve enjoyed it all,” he said.
These days Hughes is raising dogs, Bichon Frises and Yorkies, with his daughter. She does most of the work, he said. He attends the McDonald County Senior Citizen Center in Noel.
“I’ve had a pretty good life. I’ve enjoyed every bit of it,” he concluded. “I’ve had a great life, actually. It depends on how you look at things. You can look at things and make them bad or you can look at things and make them good.”