“Sometimes the water doesn’t come out the faucet, sometimes the current goes off”, but as far as 71-year-old Orlando native Lindy Faulkner is concerned, she is living her best life as a volunteer to 56 wards of the State who have found solace at City of Refuge children’s home in St Andrew, Jamaica.

Faulkner’s beaming smile was impossible to miss amongst the charges she helped chaperone at the recent National Children’s Summit in Kingston. By her own admission, the former stage manager for Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida, was hard-pressed to think of another way to spend her retirement years.

“The days are past when people want to twiddle around on a golf cart or play tennis. In America, that’s a retiring dream but that wouldn’t be half as satisfactory,” a spritely Faulkner told the Jamaica Observer.

“These kids are my heart; they are beautiful. I don’t mean to be corny but they really are. These kids keep me young. A lot of older people have said they want to do something like this when they retire. Sometimes the water doesn’t come out the faucet, sometimes the current goes off, but I couldn’t ask for a better life right now,” she told the Observer.

Faulkner, who came to Jamaica in 2017 to work with the home which is supported by her church — Glad Tidings Assembly of God in Ocoee, Florida — believes her sojourn here was divinely orchestrated.

“It’s a God thing, most of all; but when my church became involved with the home I thought that it would be something I would really enjoy doing as a volunteer, if there was some assistance I could give, and I spoke with my pastor and he said ‘yes’, so I came down and I just help in the office, just whatever I can do to help,” she shared, happily clutching bags and items left in her care by the children she was supervising.

Asked how the journey has been, Faulkner, who is proudly awaiting her “five-year anniversary” of being in Jamaica, quipped, “Educational.”

“I picked that word, educational; people say it’s rewarding and fulfilling and that’s true, but I have learnt so much about Jamaica. I’ve made it a point to learn about the culture and the history and the heroes and the kids. Just educational. I am learning patois; I am not so bold to try and speak it, but I am certainly learning to understand it. Jamaicans, I am living my best life,” she said, smiling.

Although away from her own home and family, Faulkner still has no regrets serving the children who, according to details on the website of the home, have all “been removed from harmful situations”.

“I have children and grandchildren in America, but they are very understanding. We stay in touch with WhatsApp and everything. I just can’t tell you; my heart is down here. We sang the National Anthem at the beginning [of the National Children’s summit programme] and I was like, ‘that’s mine too’. I got all teary-eyed. I mean, I’m proud of America and I love the fact that I know about that, but I just love Jamaica,” she said further.

According to the retired stage manager, who said she walked away from her job to volunteer, it was never a question of her becoming too old for those duties.

“It was a very good job, very interesting, and I loved my job. If I did not come here I would still be there; there is no retirement age, you could work until it’s all over,” she said.

Faulkner, however, has a far better ending in mind, one high up in the refreshing hills of Content Gap, St Andrew.

“I will be here until I can’t climb the steps up the mountains anymore — because we are way up in the mountains — or until God should say, ‘You’re done’, but so far, He hasn’t said that,” she told this reporter, laughing.