There she sits, dressed in a beautiful blue robe with a black sash and gray slippers with purple flowers on them.  Her white hair brushed back from her forehead reveals bright eyes behind her glasses.  Not a fan of having her picture taken, but a beautiful lady nonetheless.  A strong lady with many years behind her, she tells her story.

Ms. Lois Booker, born in 1916, moved to Baldwin County when she was about eight or ten.  Her father was a farmer in Clarke County and he moved their family and livestock on a barge down the river.  He was called a “dirt farmer” because he ran a self-sustaining farm, one which he used to provide for his family.  They took care of the farm themselves, working hard.  Ms. Booker was in the seventh grade when they moved to Foley.  There wasn’t even a street light in town when they settled there.  “It’s all-together different,” she says about the population and economic growth of the city now, compared to then.

She remembers that every Saturday they would go to town to get staple grocery items like flour and sugar, but everything else came off their farm.  On Saturdays in the summer, they would go to the park.  At about noon, concerts would be playing and families would be having picnics together.  The children would play in the park and the adults would catch up on the “gossip” of the day. 

“I think we lived better back then,” says Ms. Booker.  She says they really spent time with family and friends in the years that have past.  They visited with each other and took care of each other during the hard times.  Things were slower, and relationships were more fulfilling.  In this day and age, everything is electronic.  Face to face, in person communication doesn’t happen very often because of the “convenience” of the technology.  It’s a shame that the world has changed human interaction so much.

Ms. Booker still has an old hand crank ice cream maker that they would use when she was young.  A few families would get together and have ice cream back then and would just take the time to visit with each other.  Ms. Booker is one who loves visiting with people.  She says she’s seen a lot of good and a lot of bad throughout her years, and met some good people and some not so good people.  “If you look and listen, you can always find out those people pretty quick.”  She said her grandmother always said that some people know more about your business that you know about your business.

Ms. Booker is a hospitable lady who welcomes almost anyone into her home.  On most days, you can find her outside on her carport sitting in her plaid armchair.  "It’s a shame to waste nice days indoors," she says.  She sits in her chair and watches the gopher tortoises she raises walk about and dig in her backyard. 

Ms. Booker explains, “Gophers are not native of this part of the country.”  She calls them just “gophers” because she says they are not turtles.  Turtles live in water and they come from areas with soil that is more like clay.  It’s too sandy in this area for them to dig, but even in her backyard, they find veins of clay-like soil to dig down into. 

She loves watching animals and growing rose bushes.  In fact, the first things she shows off are her beautiful roses.  A few different ones grow in her yard, and they stay more beautiful outside in their natural environment.  She says if you cut any and bring them in, they tend to die. 

“They have more sense,” she says of animals.  She tells a story of one of her mother gopher tortoise laying eggs in her hole then covering them up with soil.  She said the mother gopher tortoise would pack that dirt for what seemed like forever until she was satisfied, and then leave those babies on their own.  They would hatch eventually and find their way out of the soil, on their own, but knowing what they needed to do to live.  It’s a mystery how they know how to do that from the time they hatch.

Ms. Booker has always been of the Baptist denomination and their family went to church every week.  She says that kids are not learning the basics these days because they aren’t in church.  Faith in God has gotten her this far and she is thankful to God that today, she can own her own home and be independent despite her age.  “I’ve had a good life,” she says, “but the world is different.”  Her advice to any of us wanting to learn from her experience and wisdom is to “do the best you can with what you’ve got and remember there’s a God in Heaven taking care of us.”