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MONROE: Woman’s secret to longevity is enjoying life

By David Kilby, Staff Writer
   MONROE — Anne Pelcyger doesn’t know how she has managed to live to be 100, but it could be due to her just enjoying life so much.
   Ms. Pelcyger, who lives at The Residence at Forsgate Assisted Living community in Monroe, will turn 100 on May 15.
   Born in Philadelphia, she moved to Queens at an early age, then moved to Brooklyn after marrying her late husband, Murray Pelcyger.
   Ms. Pelcyger has one son, Ivan, who lives in California and one daughter, Iris Blumberg. Ms. Blumberg, who works part time in customer service, visits her mother at Forsgate twice a week.
   ”She does everything for me,” said Ms. Pelcyger of her daughter. “She’s really terrific. There isn’t anything she can’t do for me.”
   ”My father was born and raised in Brooklyn so when they got married, they moved to Brooklyn,” Ms. Blumberg said, adding her mother lived there for most of her life.
   Murray Pelcyger, who died more than 20 years ago, was married to Ms. Pelcyger for more than 50 years.
   ”I don’t remember how we met, but I was crazy about him,” she said.
   She also said when she was younger, she was a very good dancer and could dance just about any kind of dance there was. Her husband, on the other hand, who was a shoe salesman for several companies, did not dance.
   ”When my husband and I went out, the boys knew he didn’t like dancing,” she said. “He would sit there and watch me dance.”
   She added, “It gives you something to do. I wish I could do it now. It makes you feel good. I would do anything to be able to dance again. I danced all my life. Any dance, I knew.”
   Ms. Blumberg and Diana Molimock, director of sales and marketing at Forsgate, shared some other things Ms. Pelcyger loved to do and some things she still does.
   ”She loved to go to weddings and bar mitzvahs. She loved to read. She used to crochet beautiful things,” Ms. Blumberg said.
   At Forsgate, she plays bingo and bowling in the Wii games and often watches movies.
   Forsgate had a big celebration as they watched the wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton on April 29.
   Ms. Molimock said the residents shared rings and made hats, and they had a traditional wedding cake during the celebration.
   ”(Ms. Pelcyger) did go to that and enjoyed it” Ms. Molimock said.
   Ms. Blumberg said her mother was a homemaker for her and Ivan as they were growing up, and once the children moved out, Ms. Pelcyger worked at a clothing store called Mays, which now is closed down, and at a “well baby clinic” where mothers would send babies for checkups, both in New York City.
   Ms. Pelcyger and her daughter said she has always loved children.
   ”I think the thing she loves the most are her children, grandchildren and great grandchildren,” Ms. Blumberg said.
   Ms. Pelcyger, who wore a Star of David charm around her neck during her interview with The Cranbury Press, doesn’t know how she has managed to live as long as she has, but believes God may have something to do with it.
   ”One hundred years is a long time,” she said. “I haven’t the faintest idea (how I lived to be 100). God did it I guess. It’s up to God.”
   Ms. Pelcyger goes to the Jewish services at Forsgate on Fridays at 1:30 p.m. when she has the strength and recognizes the high holy days in the Jewish calendar, Ms. Molimock said.
   For the most part, her life at Forsgate is relatively normal. She eats cereal for breakfast, eggs for lunch and a large variety of things for dinner, such as chicken, fish, pork or whatever else is in the Forsgate dining hall. For dessert, she said she loves to have strawberry ice cream.
   ”Oh, I do love ice cream,” she said.
   She goes to sleep at six or seven, and “they wake me up about six o’ clock which I’m not too happy about,” she said.
   Ms. Pelcyger has three great grandchildren and two grandchildren. Her grandchild, Scott, and his wife, Kelly, have two children, Mason and Danielle, and her granddaughter, Chari, has one child named Daelyn.
   ”They’re adorable,” Ms. Pelcyger said. “They have these fancy names I can’t even pronounce.”
   When asked what the most important thing in life was, she said “family” in a heartbeat.
   ”You’re born with them, you live with them,” she said.