Vicki French Is Aging Her Way

At age 68, Vicki French is eating well and exercising, but she also says she’s being more intentional about her friendships and family relationships. She’s reaching out to people, staying connected, spending quality time and making the most of every encounter, as if it were her last. She’s also writing letters to people to tell them how important they have been in her life—simply because she doesn’t know if she will have another chance to tell them. One might think that Vicki is winding down her life, but the opposite is true. Vicki is revving things up because she wants to live life to the fullest and age her way!

May is Older Americans Month, an opportunity for all of us to explore the many ways older adults can remain in and be involved with their communities. Trellis is happy to share Vicki’s story — someone who exemplifies this year’s theme, Age My Way!

Aging her way

For Vicki, aging her way means finding fulfillment in helping people in her retirement, as she did for decades as a social worker. As a volunteer with The Open Door Pantry in Dakota County, Vicki helps provide food for families in need in the pantry’s Eagan grocery store and mobile summer breakfast and lunch program for kids. “The schools have the food, and we help get it to the kids in the summer,” she says. “There are 20 Open Door mobile pantries. I pick up hundreds of meals at the schools and bring them to neighborhoods where the kids come out of their homes to get them.” Vicki says this service was most important during the pandemic when parents were unable to work and had the added expense of providing food for their children to replace the meals they got when they were in school. “It is so satisfying to help people in this way.”

Vicki worked at Trellis when it was known as the Metropolitan Area Agency on Aging. One of the things she enjoyed doing as a community living specialist was providing low-vision resources. So, when she retired, she asked Trellis to assign her as a volunteer to help people with low vision. She now provides support to two women with macular degeneration. “I go to their homes in assisted living communities and help them read their mail, address envelopes, make phone calls and run errands,” says Vicki. “I’m also their ‘right-hand woman’ for reading expiration dates on food in their refrigerators. So many things are in print in this world, and people with low or no vision need help reading them.” Vicki also enjoys reading the New York Times out loud and recording it to air on a radio program for the blind. “I loved reading out loud to my children. Reading is important, and now I can learn what’s going on in the world while helping others do the same.”

During the pandemic, Vicki joined the Dakota County Medical Reserve Corps, where she trained to help with COVID-19 vaccination clinics and testing. “I wanted to be part of the solution,” she says. “I wanted to be there to say, ‘Come and get it,’ so I helped as often as I could. But I didn’t get covid because I followed the good protocols they had in place.”

Finding your purpose

Vicki believes that all her volunteer work has helped her define her purpose. During her 40-year career, she never thought about retiring. On the job, she helped people understand their choices and make the best decisions. She helped people apply for Medicaid and move to assisted living after a transitional care stay or return to their home with adaptive services. Now that she is retired, she focuses on the things she loved about her job.

“Aging your way is feeling like you have a purpose,” she says. “I love social work and I love helping people, but I don’t miss the paperwork, meetings and hundreds of emails in my in-box. In retirement, I’m still meeting people who don’t understand Medicare and Medicaid and how to apply for them. I know how to help them. I encourage them to call the Senior LinkAge Line,® where they will get the help they need.”

Vicki has some more tips for aging your way:

1. Go outside of yourself
   “Don’t spend too much time entertaining yourself with television and puzzles. It’s not enough. Most people find happiness in doing things for other people.”
2. Set boundaries
   “Social work helped prepare me for this because I had to set boundaries around helping others, so I could also take care of myself.”  
3. Care for your aging body
   “Aging bodies require more attention, so eat well, exercise, get good sleep and go to the dentist!”
4. Get rid of stuff
   “All the stuff we have holds us back, weighs us down, keeps us in the past and keeps us from moving on to the next phase of our life. Some people postpone this for as long as possible because it’s hard, and others like me grit their teeth, get it done and feel better.”
5. Keep learning
   “I’m focusing on all the things I didn’t learn in school. It’s led me to schedule an upcoming trip to the south that includes a civil rights tour where I will learn more about African Americans, joined by my husband, John Robinson. He was raised in Jamaica and is still learning about African Americans in this country and how their experiences are different from his.”

Vicki says she works on aging her way every day. “It’s clear I can’t save the world, but I need to improve things, so I focus on helping one person at a time.” Vicki encourages people to find their purpose and narrow their focus, and she believes that it can be as simple as picking up trash every time you go for a walk. “Some days my purpose it to get all the laundry done. Other days, I go to The Open Door Pantry and have a positive interaction with every person I meet. When I do that, I can go home and feel that I did something good.”

Thank you, Vicki, for all the good things you’re doing for others, as you age your way!