NEENAH (NBC 26) — Connie Campbell is the newest interior designer at New Perspectives Assisted Living in Neenah. She says she hopes to inspire others to keep on living life to the fullest, no matter the age.
- Campbell moved to New Perspectives Island Shores three years ago.
- To help her deal with the tough adjustment, Campbell started decorating for the facility.
- Now, Connie is a resident ambassador, inspiring her neighbors to pursue new passions.
Connie Campbell finds joy in the unexpected.
“I love lovely things, I like unique things,” she says. “You know, something that not everybody has.”
When she was 73, she made the decision to move into an assisted living facility.
“I told my daughter in-law, I can’t live in this house by myself,” she says.
She says she chose New Perspectives in Neenah because it felt welcoming.
“When I walked in the door, I just got chills,” she says. “I felt at home.”
While she loved the facility, she says it was a very difficult transition.
“It’s a whole different world at an age when you don’t flip so easy,” she says. “It’s taken me three years to feel really settled.”
To help adjust, she knew she had to find a new source of happiness.
“I had to find my purpose, and I found my purpose,” she says.
Campbell volunteered as the resident interior designer.
“Connie has an eye, and she just came to me and said, ‘I would love to help you’,” Susan Dart, executive director of Island Shores, says.
Campbell has decorated nearly every common space in New Perspectives. Now, she hopes to inspire her neighbors to find their own interests.
“I want them to live before they die, does that make sense?” she says. “Yes, we’re all going to die, but there’s a reason that we’re here. It’s not a holding tank for old people; it’s a different life.”
May is Older Americans Month, according to the Administration for Community Living.
“We celebrate this every day,” Dart says. “It’s just a journey of new beginnings.”
