After years of letters and phone calls, Doreen Parker of Radisson finally met her pen pal of 63 years during a recent trip to Nova Scotia.
"It was a wonderful, wonderful experience," says Parker of her chance to meet Libby Caldwell of Sweets Corner, Hants County.
Parker's daughters Darla Price of Shellbrook and Laureen Kari of Biggar organized the five-day trip.
"I have always wanted Mom to meet Libby so this past February I called Libby to see if she would like to meet Mom," says Price. "She said of course, however she didn't travel, but if we were to go there that would be terrific. So I got the ball rolling and on Mom's birthday we told her that we wanted to take her to meet Libby. She was very excited."
Parker and Caldwell share a birthday. They were both born March 5, 1938, making them 75 years old this year. They were 12 years old when they became pen pals.
Parkers says it was through either the Family Herald or the Free Press that they found one another; it's been so long she can't remember which.
"I picked her because we had the same birthday," says Parker.
Once they started corresponding, they found they had many things in common, and Parker often referred to Caldwell as her "twin pen pal."
There was a time, says Parker, when their correspondence had been reduced to communicating with cards on their birthday and at Christmas. They were both busy at that time with work and raising a family. Parker raised five children.
But then came the age of long distance bundles and their previous correspondence was mostly replaced by telephone calls. Several times a year they would exchange calls.
However, they never exchanged photos. So, when Parker and her daughters were disembarking from the plane in Halifax, they didn't know who to look for.
Parker said one of her daughters had picked out a grey-haired couple in the crowd and was waving at them, but got no response. Then, they saw the group right at the gate who seemed to be waiting excitedly for them, says Parker, and they knew they'd found her pen pal.
Caldwell didn't look like what Parker thought she would from the sound of her voice on the telephone. In fact, she was amazed at how much she and her pen pal looked alike.
"Everybody said we could have been twins," says Parker, after all the years of her calling Caldwell her "pen pal twin."
Caldwell lives on an acreage at Sweets Corner, County Hants, near Windsor, N.S. She has hens and sells eggs and does most of her own yard work.
"She's more energetic than I am," laughs Parker.
Parker lives in senior housing in Radisson.
Both women are widowed.
Since neither travel much, they may not meet in person again, but their friendship continues. Nowadays they are more "telephone pals" than pen pals, but their chance to meet has brought them that much closer, though they are half a country apart.
