Even at age 100, Ann Lazarowicz still enjoys the good life — going out to eat with her son, playing cards with friends and getting her hair done weekly by her favorite stylist.
“I like to go outside and piddle around with my flowers,” said Lazarowicz over brunch at a pancake house in Oak Forest near where she lives. “I sit in the garage (with the door open) and enjoy the weather.
Lazarowicz and her son Denny celebrated her birthday Wednesday with dinner at Isabella’s Cafe in Tinley Park. But he organized a big dinner and party with about 25 relatives for her at an area seafood restaurant last weekend where she enjoyed lobster, one of her favorite meals.
Another birthday to-do for her with a few friends also was in the works.
“I’m happy,” she said, with an easy smile.
Denny Lazarowicz said when he recently took his mom to the doctor, her physician said, “I must be doing a great job.” She does have macular degeneration and has been on blood pressure medication for a number of years.
Her son said her longevity might result from growing up on a farm in Armstrong Creek, Wisconsin, where Ann, her two sisters and two brothers were raised on vegetables and a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar daily. The kids helped out on the working farm, where their parents sold most of the livestock meat and cream to make ends meet.
“She had it pretty rough when she was a kid,” said her son. “I think she just appreciates every little thing.”
She loves flowers, so her son gets her fresh ones weekly.
“I don’t want flowers when I’m dead. I want them now,” Ann recently told her son.
She had a big garden when she and her husband, John, and their kids, Diane and Denny, lived in Chicago, before moving to Oak Forest.
They go grocery shopping weekly at a local Jewel-Osco, where employees know her and come up to hug her
In earlier days, Ann was celebrated for her big home-cooked meals, including her lamb cakes with buttercream frosting for dessert. She enjoyed dancing at the Willowbrook Ballroom with her husband, John, until he died in 1991. She then met a new dance partner and beau, spending time with him until he died.
“I loved dancing, the polka and all the other dances,” said Lazarowicz, whose parents were immigrants from Poland.
She met her husband after moving to Chicago from the farm, at a tool company, where they both worked.
Ann could be strict when her son was mischievous, he recalled, saying, “wait until your dad comes home.” But when his dad came home, he would say, “You listen to your mother” and give him “that look.”
She had a nurturing side, too, taking care of her daughter, Diane, as a baby and in her last years when she was stricken with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
Ann Lazarowicz said she has a way of dealing with the ups and downs of life.
“I take things as they come,” she said. “I don’t get upset.”
She did say Denny has been a tremendous help.
“He’s easy to get along with and he’s loveable,” Ann said. “He does whatever I want.”
Her son, who lives in Crestwood, said his dad made dinner for the family if his mother was at work, and the two of them were affectionate — they would never go to bed angry.
Ann still lives alone, is able to go up and down the steps in her home and fix simple meals, such as toast and coffee for breakfast.
Denny comes by twice daily to check on his mother, bringing her a meal of ribs or shrimp (if they aren’t going out) and transporting her to appointments and other outings. He also helps keep up her home.
“I tell ma, you used to wipe my butt when I was a kid, now it’s my turn,” he joked.
But he also enjoys her company.
“You ask her to go out and she’s like, ‘Let’s go’ and puts on her makeup,” he said.
One of her favorite pals is Alice Bleskin, who has done her hair in Orland Park for more than 50 years.
“We’ve just been friends for so long, seeing our children and grandkids grow together,” Bleskin said. “We’ve shared so much (including) the death of our husbands. She’s such a warm, nice person to me, just a sweetheart and a very nice lady.”
Janice Neumann is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.
