Living Memories

Like Lightning
Betty Allgood

If you see Betty Allgood sitting down somewhere, you need to speak to her right then and there. Don't hesitate. If you do, you may not get the chance again because once she gets on her feet, you'll never catch her. She's fast. Not just fast. I'm talking really fast. Wilma Rudolph fast. Richard Petty fast. Lightning strike fast.

The blur that just went by your window? That could have been Betty Allgood.

She's a race walker. Has been since 1993. Her husband kept in shape after retirement by participating in the Senior Olympics. Competing in the 100m, 200m, 400m, 800m, 1 mile, and the long jump, his commitment to athletics and love of competition inspired her to make her own mark in the Senior Olympic world. She taught herself the race walk form and for the next fourteen years, she burned up tracks and pavement on her way to setting two state records. Along the way, she proved over and over again that a good life and good health doesn't end at 60.

She traveled all over the United States racing and leaving grown women crying in her wake. No human could stop her. Nothing could knock her out of competition.except a vacuum cleaner. She finally met her match last year when she fought an upright and lost as it landed a cheap shot to her knee. She's since recovered and is moving quickly once again, but hasn't stepped back into competition yet. She doesn't touch that vacuum cleaner anymore either, now that she lets the folks at Homestead Hills vacuum for her.

She'd spent her entire life on the same farm, first with her family and then with her husband and her three boys. The two of them built their home by hand. "It was an experience to saw down loblolly pines and cut them up into logs and then manually load the logs on the wagon to get them to the sawmill," Betty relays, "We had to roll them up to the wagon bed. It was just hard work, but you had the sense of satisfaction you had accomplished something you didn't think you could ever do. It instilled in me there's nothing I can't do if I put my mind to it." But after seventy years of living on the same piece of land, the responsibilities grew and she finally realized she needed a change.

"I just didn't need the responsibility anymore of the house, the yard and all that kind of stuff. Every time the boys came home there was always a chore for them to do and that made me feel bad? Something needed to be fixed. But they're pleased that I'm here at Homestead Hills, and I'm pleased that I'm here. It's a good place to be."

"One Sunday afternoon, after lunch, something led me to come here and look around. I was real impressed. The first visit intrigued me and looked like something I'd like to find out more about. And then I did."

Betty continues, "I visited everything in Winston Salem, but I was pleased with this community. I was pleased with what it offered, the location and it just was a good fit for me. It's close to restaurants.the mall.doctors and hospitals. It's a good place to be.a convenient place. I think it only took me about four or five months to decide, 'yes, that is what I want to do.'"

She adds, "I didn't know what to expect with all the people, but it has turned out to be just like a big family. Everybody looks after everybody else. Everybody is so friendly. It's not always easy going into a new place to get acquainted and get along but it's really been good here."

Now that the vacuum has found its permanent resting place in the closet, Betty can concentrate on her family, her church and all the other little things in life she likes to do. She accentuates this by saying, "The maintenance? You call on the phone and you turn around and the man is already here doing what you need them to be doing. They really are good."

While the maintenance men and housekeepers are hard at work, Betty is back out hitting the pavement. Just the other day, as she was out making her daily walk around the community, one of the construction workers from the new clubhouse and villas yelled down to her, "You're burnin' the pavement up. Slow down!"

That construction worker hasn't figured out what Betty Allgood knows: At Homestead Hills, you can live at whatever pace you like because there is no work to slow you down.