Times were different when Pia McNabb was hired to do the laundry at the 100 Mile hospital in 1985.
Not only did she use her husband’s grandmother’s name to get the gig because back then “who you know” mattered, but the facility was “just a tiny hospital” then. But over the next 36 years, she would watch it grow, starting with the development of Mill Site Lodge, followed by Fischer Place.
“I just enjoyed watching so much being done for our community and being a part of it,” said McNabb, 64, who has lived in 100 Mile House for 50 years. “I thoroughly enjoyed working here. I hate to let go but there’s a time to go.”
McNabb officially retired Tuesday from a health care career that took her from laundry worker to transport attendant - picking up meals from the kitchen in the hospital basement - at Mill Site Lodge, followed by housekeeper and patient and resident caregiver at Fischer Place. At a celebration this week, friends and co-workers presented McNabb with flowers and gifts and blue and white topped cupcakes arranged in a 36 formation.
McNabb, whose first job at Mill Site Lodge was driving an old blue van, loaded up with food in coolers and fresh linen carts to be delivered up the hill from hospital basement, said she will miss the work and friends she has made over the decades but said “it’s time for a change of routine.”
She plans to spend more time with her family and friends at their lot on Canim Lake, and do more skiing in the winter and gardening in the summer with her husband. She acknowledges, however, that she will likely be “a little bored” and may come back in six months, noting she has a lot of respect and takes a lot of pride in the hospital.
“It’s like home here,” she said. “I just feel comfortable. Just looking at all my coworkers - we’ve known each other for so many years.”
