By Jay Sorgi • Posted November 6, 2025

Keeping vibrant at 90 years old, or even 100 years of age, stands as a challenge to anyone whom God has blessed with life for that long.

Five women from four Catholic Charities of Philadelphia senior centers reveal their life journeys and some of their secrets for encountering joy at, and beyond, 90 years old.

Nativity B.V.M. Senior Community Center, Northeast Philadelphia: Carol Bates, 97

Carol Bates immediately elicits laughter when asked  how to spell her name.

“B-A-T-E-S, like Bates Motel,” she jokes while sitting inside the Nativity B.V.M. Community Senior Center as she does three days a week. “They mention it here often.”

It sounds like laughter and friendship surround Bates, who says growing older has not been a burden, but a joy.

“Just being alive at this age,” she said. “I just like to be with people.”

Bates’ vibrancy shines through the wardrobe she wears every day.

She still shops on her own, and the fan of pink, purple and “pretty blues” loves to shop and find blingy accoutrements that shine like she does.

Her friends at Nativity will also attest to her skills at the Bingo table, which leads to a lot of conversation.

“The girls are great. We are not catty,” Bates said. “I can’t stand poor gossip.”

A mother of two sons, grandmother of four and great-grandmother of three, Bates aims to spend the Christmas holidays making wreaths, but doesn’t limit her craft to the yuletide season.

“I have one that has pumpkins, scarecrows and the color of autumn, oranges, and burgundies,” she said with pride.

She also has a sharp mind that remembers phone numbers as effectively as one’s mobile phone.

“I wanted a phone number for Walmart on Roosevelt Boulevard. So they gave it to me at 215-698-0350. And then I wanted another one down Oregon Avenue, the Whitman Plaza. That number was naturally 215-389-0571,” she accurately conveyed, naturally from memory.

That steel trap of a mind also can offer as many accurate movie details as online cinema sites IMDb or Rotten Tomatoes, at least for the movies she loves.

“Gone with the Wind? Vivian Leigh and Clark Gabel. Olivia de Havilland and Leslie Howard,” she recited. “Undercurrent (1946), which I thought was very good. Katherine Hepburn, Robert Taylor and Robert Mitchum.”
Bates revealed that the undercurrent of her vibrancy is her faith.

“God is my help in every need. God walks beside me. He guides my way through every moment of the day,” she said.

“You know who’s making me go on? God. God is saying, ‘Come on, Carol, get up. You can do it.’”

Norris Square Senior Community Center, North Philadelphia: Ramonita Melendez, 90

It’s a short journey from Ramonita Melendez’s apartment to the Norris Square Senior Community Center, a journey of just a few steps.

That short jaunt has given her a long relationship of love and connection, as the center has been open for all of Melendez’s 24 years at her current home.

“I’m so proud being part of this center, because in this center, people treat me with love and affection,” she said through an interpreter. “The food is really good here. This center is really, really clean all the time, and the staff who work here are really good too, very nice with me.”

Melendez believes the key to her long life is to live a very relaxed way.

At age 90, she also takes care of her body well — particularly her skin, using a common household element.

“I like to use some creams to take care of my skin, my face, and (I) use sugar because it keeps my skin in the way that you can see,” she said, proudly showing off her facial care. “I like to wash my hair, my face with sugar.”

Christmastime at Norris Square brings Melendez her favorite activity of every year, the chance to play the Virgin Mary during the center’s Christmas celebration.

“Jesus, Jesus Christ. I feel happy at Christmas. Jesus Christ was born that day,” she said. “I love to put decorations up for the day. I enjoy the parties over here.”

That annual Christmas party reflects the sense of service and purpose the Norris Square center gives to her, one that she has lived by her whole life.

“This center, so many people spend so much time, not just receiving, but giving of themselves,” Melendez said.

“It comes from the heart, to help, and if I have to cooperate in something important, I like to give my little grain.”

All that, she says, springs from the faith that powers Norris Square’s presence in so many seniors’ lives.

“Everybody,” Melendez said, “needs God in their hearts.”

St. Edmond’s Senior Community Center, South Philadelphia: Martha Copes, 98, and Flossie Hines, 101

Martha Copes is set to turn 99 years old in December and start her last double-digit year on Earth, with hopes of reaching 100 in 2026.

“I love life,” she said, “I love my family, and whatever I can do for people, it’s alright with me.”

Staying close to people can be a tall order because of the size of her family. Counting children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, she has 61 family members.

“It’s something that I got used to and love,” she said. “Birthday parties, special dinners, going out for lunch, going out to the restaurant, and sticking together all day. We enjoy each other.”

Being present to others has been a part of the 1944 South Philadelphia High School graduate’s formula.
“I served patients meals at CHOP (Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia) in the dietary department,” she said.

“The kids were always happy.”

Copes often didn’t end her workday at the hospital. She often tended the bar at a neighborhood tavern to help her family, connecting with others as she served up a cocktail.

Now, she serves up lessons in how to win at Bingo while hanging out at St. Edmond’s.

“They treat me so nice. They really do,” she said. “Everybody calls me ‘Mom.’ I enjoy them.”

Part two of Copes’ formula involves something she has done for as long as she has been alive. She gets her moves going on the dance floor, and she still can do it.

While she expressed love for Aretha Franklin’s songs, she is not too choosy about what gets her out of her chair and into her dancing groove.

“As long as it’s got a good tune to it, it’s all right with me,” she said proudly, adding that her life often feels like a musical.

The third part of Copes’ formula for life is the most important: her love of God and seeing the Lord’s face in others.

“With the kids at CHOP. With (all) kids. With Kim, the lady at (St. Edmond’s) center. She’s really nice,” she said, adding her own family of course.

But she’s not even the oldest person to grace St. Edmond’s. Flossie Hines, who turned 101 last month, also worked in a hospital for a living, aiding at Jefferson Hospital while working as a clothing trimmer.

Service has remained a part of her life, including as an election clerk in the city’s Ward 36, as a volunteer helping children arrive at school, and at her church.

While St. Edmond’s provides her with community and activities, Hines gives her baking expertise to the center, with renowned butter pound cakes that reflect her own sweetness nurtured by a century and more of life.

Star Harbor Senior Community Center, Southwest Philadelphia: Ann Wyatt, 93

Mondays and Thursdays become Ann Wyatt’s days for creating clothing on the sewing machines of Star Harbor’s busy second floor.

The center, which shares an intersection with St. Francis de Sales Church, bustles with the sound of 1970s soul music, chatter between friends and the sound of Wyatt and her sewing coach’s machinery.

“This teacher, she has the patience,” she said of her instructor. “If I’m here, I know she has the patience!”

Virtues have surrounded Wyatt’s life experience, one filled with charity — giving and volunteering for organizations ranging from MANNA (Metropolitan Area Neighborhood Nutrition Alliance), which provides health-tailored meals for people in need, to CHOP’s Daisy Days campaign.

“We used to stand on the corner of Broad and Chestnut for Daisy Days,” said Wyatt. “I used to stand there, after I retired, at the corner of Broad and Chestnut with my cup for Children’s Hospital.”

Wyatt, who can still drive, has added her voice to various singalong groups, though she would never consider herself a loud choir singer. She has served as an usher at church and  on numerous boards of directors for charitable efforts.

She credits her mother for instilling a spirit of service within her.

“My mom used to tell us, ‘Don’t take anything, and do what you can for people,’” Wyatt said.

That attitude also extended to her career as a pediatric nurse at Philadelphia General Hospital.

“I worked in surgery, and I worked in neurology where they helped stroke victims and people that were paralyzed,” she said.

Wyatt knew she was seeing the face of Christ in the patients whom she daily served.

“I could see it,” she said. “It’s how you treat people.”

All these elements to Wyatt’s journey stem from a gratitude-filled belief in God, one which Star Harbor’s Catholic mission reflects.

“I get up in the morning and I thank God because I don’t know if I’m gonna be alive the next day,” she said. “And when I go at night, I thank Him again.”

Wyatt’s willingness to give is how she still lives her faith in her 90s, and her life is still marked by giving a yes when God calls to her.

“You can’t say no,” she said. “I can’t say no.”