For Blair, Aging Services represents more than just a meal

By Jimmy Lewis

For Chatham News & Record

ONE OF PHYLLIS BLAIR’S most prized possessions is a photo album of her October 2007 wedding day.

Sure, it contains the images one would expect of bride and groom exchanging vows and the obligatory admiration of the cake.

But beyond that, each page is filled with an abundance of faces. They represent Blair’s friends, uniting to celebrate a momentous occasion inside the venue that served to bring them together in the first place — the Eastern Chatham Senior Center.

“It meant a whole lot, because I had known them for a long time,” Blair said. “They were all here that day. Some of them are still here after 12 years. They’re the ones that I enjoy coming and seeing. The staff is just great. They do a lot to help all of us. So, that’s why I still come.”

Indeed, Blair and her late husband, Oscar, are a unique part of the history of Chatham County Aging Services. Not only did they meet at the Eastern Center, but the couple became the first — and only — clients of the center to wed.

With that in mind, there was simply no other venue to commemorate the day.

“We met here, and all our friends were here,” Blair said. “So this was a logical place to have it. I don’t know what we would have done if we hadn’t gotten married here. We probably would have gone down to the courthouse, said ‘I do!’ and that’s it!”

In February 2006 — as detailed by the Chatham News + Record in its Nov. 1, 2007 edition — Oscar noticed Phyllis sitting across from him at the

Eastern Center. The following week, he made it a point to sit next to her. Before leaving that day, Phyllis mentioned needing a ride to Walmart to buy thread.

Oscar offered to drive her, and Phyllis, who utilizes bus transportation to come to the center, accepted. Before they could return from the store, Oscar asked her to dinner.

Some 20 months later, they were married.

“We wanted our friends to come, so I asked the director here if we could get married, and she said yes. So my family planned a nice wedding, and it was a big thing then.”

“We met here, and all our friends were here. So, this was a logical place to have it.”

Phyllis Blair

Phyllis, who is originally from Michigan and Oscar, a 30year Navy veteran from Virginia Beach, Virginia, decided to return to Michigan and spent four years there. When Oscar passed

Chatham County Public Health Department