WAYNE – Anna Pacyna went back to Poland when she was a girl of 80 years old and was asked by cousins to what she attributed her long life. She replied, “Don’t drink, don’t smoke and don’t stay up late.”

Her recipe for long life has worked well. Pacyna was poised to mark 105 years on March 15.

Asked what she does for fun, Pacyna replied, “Nothing. Every day is fun.”

Excited to be 105?

“Very much.”

Her daughter, Terry Vorhauer, said her mother was living independently in Chicago until a year ago when she came to live with her in Batavia. They met at cousin Dawn Trujillo’s house in Wayne to talk about Pacyna’s remarkable life, with Vorhauer translating questions in Polish to her mother.

Pacyna was born Anna Rembadz in Chicago on March 15, 1918, during the Spanish Flu that killed more than 21 million people worldwide. A tiny premature infant weighing two pounds, she was not expected to live.

“Now look at her,” Vorhauer said. “They didn’t have an incubator. They immediately baptized her. They had not even named the child or had godparents because they did not think she would survive. She was in a little bunting they kept by the fireplace and neighbors and family members took turns around the clock to take care of the baby.”

The baby – named Anna – survived, and the family went back to Poland when she was a toddler, 2 or 3 years old. When she was 10, a tornado picked her up and deposited her on a barn roof, then came roaring back, snatched up the child again and dumped her in a pond.

“She got up and went home,” Vorhauer said.

Pacyna was the second child of eight, four girls and four boys. The eighth child, a girl, died in childbirth in Poland. The midwife could not get there in time due to not wanting to pass a mean dog while traveling in a horse and carriage, Vorhauer said.

Pacyna returned to the U.S. in 1935 when she was 17 on a ship that cracked in half during the voyage. The boat didn’t sink, but it took three days to be rescued, a traumatizing experience, Vorhauer said.

Back in Chicago, Pacyna married, had a son and a daughter and was widowed. She raised her children by herself, supporting the family by working at a pinball machine factory called Gottlieb in Chicago, and never remarried, Vorhauer said.

Her son has since passed away.

She has two grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

Her only surviving sibling, Josephine Pokrzywa, died a week ago at age 99. She would have been 100 on March 22, Vorhauer said.

They immediately baptized her. They had not even named the child or had godparents because they did not think she would survive.

—  Terry Vohauer, Anna's daughter

Pacyna rides a stationery bike every morning, does word-find puzzles, a peg puzzle and plays gin rummy.

“And she cheats at cards,” Vorhauer said while her mother laughed. “She marked all the cards with little dots.”

As the family played years ago, Vorhauer’s late brother realized the cards were marked.

“My brother picked up a card and said to me, ‘Which one is this?’ I said, ‘I don’t know.’ He said, ‘Two of diamonds,’” Vorhauer said.

He went through a bunch of cards and to Vorhauer’s amazement, her brother said they all were marked.

“On the corner of the cards were little dots. She marked all the cards,” Vorhauer said. “Her own son narced on her. I was shocked.”

They got another deck of cards, but Pacyna marked those, too.

“She always liked winning,” Vorhauer said.

Pacyna has not had a major illness in her life, and the only surgeries she had were to remove her gall bladder and appendix and to put in a pacemaker 20 years ago.

“Her cardiologist said she would live another 10 years,” Vorhauer said.

Family and friends will celebrate her milestone March 20 at the community dinner at St. Patrick Catholic Church in St. Charles.