However reluctantly, my mother returned to her native state two years ago. She didn’t want to leave the warmth of central Florida. Mostly, she didn’t want to lose the walks with her friends on all but the hottest days and, especially, the nearby pool.

But as she advanced into her mid-80s, we worried that she was too far from family members – the nearest was about 1,000 miles away – and, in her phone calls, letters and visits, we were seeing indications that she needed more of a safety net than she had living alone in a mobile home with neighbors who looked in on her.

If she considered moving to the Lewiston-Auburn area, we promised her we’d find her the most important component – a pool.

Even so, it wasn’t an easy sell. My husband and I well remember those months she stayed with us in which we’d expected to spend some of the time visiting assisted living homes for her to consider. She actually was scheduled to fly to Florida, which would have put off any consideration of this alternative for some distant time, when international events intervened and all airline service shut down in the immediate days after Sept. 11.

The resolution to our impasse happened quickly. She stayed longer, into the fall of 2001. And eventually she and I went “just to look,” in my frequent phrase to her, at what was supposed to be the first of the area assisted living places we’d visit. We didn’t go to any others. She liked what she saw. I backed off. Before she returned to Florida to pack, she decided to put a deposit on a one-bedroom apartment in a Lewiston retirement community. She and I’d both noted that it had walking paths for those who like to walk as much as she does. Plus, I knew that the YWCA, which has a fine pool, wasn’t far away.

This necessity to consider Mom’s needs as an athlete has been part of her later years. Not only is it fascinating to see how much her years of exercising have contributed to the quality of her life now, but she’s set a standard for the rest of us. It’s just not as easy to be comfortable on the couch when Mom might be wearing her favorite necklace, the one with a silver disc engraved “500 miles.” Nor is it possible to figure that it’s all right to let down a bit, OK to think that age itself is a good reason to slow down when I’m about the same age Mom was when she accelerated her life.

During a recent routine checkup, her doctor told her that he sees quite a few patients in their 40s who act as if they’re 80, but doesn’t see many in their 80s like her who act as if they’re in their 40s. He couldn’t decide whether it was more accurate to call her “feisty” or “spunky.”

As a child, I saw those traits in other female dynamos in her family when I’d visit them in Rockland. Those characteristics probably gave her the determination to recover after she spent weeks in a hospital bed waiting for a fracture to heal when she was in her early 60s.

When she finally was allowed up, she was advised that walking and swimming would help her regain her strength. She’d done the first, but rarely the latter one. She could hardly get down the lane the first time.

Not only did she keep trying, but for the first time in her life she began taking swimming lessons, something that probably wasn’t readily available to her as a kid. Also, she grew up on Penobscot Bay whose cold Atlantic waters never appealed to her.

Soon she had memberships in both the Jewish Community Center and the YWCA in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., near her Hudson Valley home. She was counting her laps, a quarter of a mile, a half or, on her good days, a mile at a time. All that flexibility kept her arthritis under control. More laps. More miles, 300, 400. Obviously, she was going to hit 500. My sister, brother and I made preparations. As soon as I knew the date, I went to a store and ordered the silver disc and chain. The reverse side has the date in 1985 she accomplished it and her initials, HdeRC.

She told me she was sick of counting laps and would only swim for pleasure now. But her newfound habits prevailed. Soon she was nearing 700, which she passed. Then, a few years later, 1,000 miles, about the distance to my sister’s home near Louisville, Ky. I think she did stop counting then, but I’m not sure.

My sister, Barbara, gave her a membership to the YWCA here. In the two years she’s been living in Lewiston, she’s had opportunities to swim, but not as many as we’d hoped. Some health problems have intervened. Yet her bounce-back capability from each one has been considerable. Her muscle tone is great, as are her lungs. Her mind is sharp.

On Friday, we’ll gather from several states to celebrate Helen deRochemont Cole’s 90th birthday and toast this native Mainer’s health. She’s gained her good health and this quality of life that it has created, lap by lap, pool by pool, mile by mile.

Marj Patrick is daytime copy editor for the Sun Journal.

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