Some folks may not realize that Enid "Dimps" Horn, an indispensable mainstay in the office at 100 Mile House Elementary School, has been there for 48 years.
Over her decades as secretary in the school office, most of it working full time, Dimps says she has always loved her job and still does today.
"It has been just good times – good friendships and watching the kids grow from little kindergarten kids to their 'graduation' year and going on [to secondary school]."
Dimps explains she first started at the job in the fall of 1967 working under principal Cliff Orr after being hired and initially trained by vice-principal Ray Truant earlier that spring.
A lot of staff have come and gone during that time, but those two administrators were at her school for years and are still in the community today, she notes.
"Cliff Orr was probably my principal for 25 years."
When she took on the role, Dimps was fresh out of Vancouver Vocational School, which she attended for two years after graduating Peter Skene Ogden Secondary School in 1965.
Born and raised in the South Cariboo, she has also spent her whole life in a key role running the family business and ranch at Watch Lake Lodge – now as its sole proprietor – on top of her job at the school.
"I worked full time for years, and then ... mom (Alice Horn) got hurt in the late 1970s, and so in the early '80s, I traded jobs with the other secretary and I did the one day a week [shift] and she did the five.
"It was a serious accident.... Mom wasn't well, so I stayed at the lodge. I came home and did a lot of stuff while she recovered."
When she returned to take on more days at the school again, Dimps job-shared with another secretary there for two-and-a-half days each. Then later, she went back to one-day-a-week for a while when her family duties at the lodge increased again, she explains.
After her dad, Walter "Shorty" Horn, died in 2009, Dimps returned to full-time secretarial duties the following year, and continues to be at the school every day with a smile and a happy heart.
"Not once in all these years have I had doubts – it is a huge part of my life. I have made lifelong friends with the teachers and support staff....
"It is like my family, and I still have kids of kids [who were students] ... and there are even grandkids."
It is "kind of exciting and a good feeling" to hear from generations of past students, she explains.
"I have people coming in and registering their kids, and it is like 'Dimps! You are still here'!"
Dimps adds she still feels this way today, and has made no plans to do anything else with
her weekdays.
"I am still so happy and I look forward to going there every day. It is a great atmosphere; it's a great school, and it's just a good feeling."