Lewis likes slower pace of senior life

Published 12:53 am Saturday, September 3, 2011

Editor’s note: Fifty Plus is a weekly feature that provides a look at area senior citizens, their accomplishments and their life experiences. Fifty Plus prospects are asked to fill out a questionnaire concerning their lives.

———

Carolyn Lewis

This week’s Fifty Plus takes a look at Carolyn Lewis, a retired educator.

Where are you from originally?

New York City.

When did you move here? Why?

1963. To attend East Carolina Teachers College (now East Carolina University).

To what clubs/church do you belong?

St. Peter’s Episcopal Church.

Education (list schools, starting with high school)

Taft High School (New York City), ECU.

If you weren’t doing what you are doing now, what would you be doing?

If I was not retired, I would be teaching in a preschool (program).

If you had a million dollars, what would you do with it?

Pay off bills for my family and myself, donate to a charity and travel.

What is the thing most people don’t know about you?

As a child, my dream was to be a dancer.

What is your favorite food?

Anything chocolate.

What’s the last book you read?

“Family Tree” by Barbara Delinsky.

What is your favorite TV show?

“Hot in Cleveland” or “Survivor.”

Where would you go on your dream vacation?

To revisit Alaska.

What is your pet peeve?

General rudeness in today’s society.

What’s the best advice you ever received and who gave it to you?

My father told me to work my best no matter what the job.

What’s the biggest difference between life as a senior as opposed to below age 30?

A slower pace — and the discounts are good! I also laugh a lot more.

Compiled by Mike Voss

About Mike Voss

Mike Voss is the contributing editor at the Washington Daily News. He has a daughter and four grandchildren. Except for nearly six years he worked at the Free Lance-Star in Fredericksburg, Va., in the early to mid-1990s, he has been at the Daily News since April 1986.
Journalism awards:
• Pulitzer Prize for Meritorious Public Service, 1990.
• Society of Professional Journalists: Sigma Delta Chi Award, Bronze Medallion.
• Associated Press Managing Editors’ Public Service Award.
• Investigative Reporters & Editors’ Award.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Public Service Award, 1989.
• North Carolina Press Association, Second Place, Investigative Reporting, 1990.
All those were for the articles he and Betty Gray wrote about the city’s contaminated water system in 1989-1990.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Investigative Reporting, 1991.
• North Carolina Press Association, Third Place, General News Reporting, 2005.
• North Carolina Press Association, Second Place, Lighter Columns, 2006.
Recently learned he will receive another award.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Lighter Columns, 2010.
4. Lectured at or served on seminar panels at journalism schools at UNC-Chapel Hill, University of Maryland, Columbia University, Mary Washington University and Francis Marion University.