Still queen of the laundry after 50 years

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Monique Paulhus started working in the laundry department of the then-Miseriscordia Hospital when she was 17 and she's still going strong.

Monique Paulhus was a 17-year-old fresh from the farm when she started working in the laundry department at Misericordia Hospital. They said she wouldn't last because the work was hard and repetitive.

Fifty years later, the senior citizen is still on the job. She's got no plans for retirement. Paulhus likes the work, she likes the people and she's not sure what she'd do sitting around at home.

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Monique Paulhus, seen in forefront in 1964 photo, wearing eyeglasses.

"Here, I'm busy," she says. "Why would I stay home?"

Paulhus, who could easily pass for being in her mid-'50s, has found a home, of sorts, in the basement of what is now the Misericordia Health Centre. To reach the laundry, you have to clamber down hidden staircases, duck under the original steam pipes and see the underbelly of the hospital. If you wanted to hide a body, this is where you'd come.

Her work area is a comfortable place with the continuous rumble of massive driers and the smell of warm laundry. It's clean. It's neat. Everything is organized.

Paulhus remembers when the facilities were run by nuns. Indeed, she and her sister lived with the nuns for three years after she moved from Richer. It was a room-and-board situation and the sisters kept a close eye on their young charges.

The laundry job is somewhat easier than it used to be. When she began, the women were handling all the laundry from a large, active hospital. There were three huge washers that each held between 350 and 400 pounds of clothing and sheets. There were three enormous driers. It took two men to separate the hundreds of pounds of laundry so it could be dried.

After the sheets, towels and other items were dry, they were run through a mangle. The device essentially pressed the linens flat. It took two people in the back to feed it, she recalls, and two at the front to receive the items. As soon as a laundry cart was full, they'd hit a buzzer and two girls from the linen department would take the cart upstairs and distribute the clean items.

They didn't make much money, Paulhus remembers, and they worked hard.

In the early years, a pair of porters would deliver the heavy carts to the wards. Now, much of the laundry service has been regionalized. Towels and the like are washed off-site. The laundry handles staff uniforms and residents' clothing.

There were plenty of chances for Paulhus to quit along the years. She married Raymond 49 years ago. They have three daughters and six grandchildren. She says her daughters nag her to quit.

"What for? What keeps me going is being active, eating healthy and working 50 years. You need a life with no stress.

"I love my job and I don't have any clue what I'd do at home."

She says she's proud at the end of the day and that's what matters most.

With the health centre a quieter place these days, she's able to get in a little visiting when she returns residents' clothing. The older people appreciate a kind word and a smile, she says.

"We're busy but not as busy," she says. "I remember when I started here and I was told it was coffee break time. I was from the farm and you just worked. I had no idea what a coffee break was."

She's got lots of stories of the old days, many of them featuring the nuns who trained and sometimes worked by her side. There's respect and affection as she talks about those long-ago days. Those sisters guided a young farm girl and let her find a safe place to live and work.

Monday morning, the Misericordia has arranged for a limo to pick Paulhus up at her house and bring her to work in style. Then she'll climb down the crooked stairs and traverse the maze that leads to the laundry room.

She's a little flummoxed by the attention.

"It's just me," she says, her colour rising. "When the limo goes away, it's just me."

There is one final question for the queen of clean sheets and well-pressed uniforms. Who does the laundry at her house?

"I do," she says as though it were a given. "I don't like anyone touching my laundry."

lindor.reynolds@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition December 10, 2010 A9