I miss my friend, Jennie.

You might ask why, since I only saw her once or twice a year.

But Jennie was my pen-pal, and my mailbox will be forever void of the lovely letters she often sent me.

Jennie died recently at a local nursing home at 92 leaving a lovely legacy, at least in my mind. She would have been 93 this Tuesday.

I met her 11 years ago when I went to her house on Oakland Street in Waterville to do a story about the police department’s Are You OK? program, which was new at the time.

John Morris, who is now commissioner of the Maine Department of Public Safety, was Waterville police chief at the time and the first in the state to develop the program.

It was a computer-aided system that checked in on older people and shut-ins every day to make sure they were all right.

It would call Jennie’s house once or twice a day and she would pick up the phone and say hello or just hang up after letting the police department know she was home.

If no one answered, police would check on her.

Jennie was 82 then and volunteered to be interviewed for a story about the program, which she viewed as a godsend.

Her health was not great. She had heart trouble, respiratory problems, high blood pressure and arthritis.

It was around Christmas, and she told me her three sisters had all died of cancer the year before within three months of each other, and her only son died at 50, two months before I visited her.

“There were five people that were calling every day and, all of a sudden, nothing,” she said.

So when the Are You OK? program started, she was delighted to be checked on every day, and she told Morris so.

“I had to write a thank-you note,” she said. “It helped me so much, and I felt so relieved.”

She also confided that she thought Morris was pretty cute and relished the idea that she helped promote his program. Jennie had a great sense of humor.

From the start, I knew she was no ordinary person. She was a voracious reader and loved to watch movies. She also was a painter, and the walls of her home were lined with her artwork.

A Brooklyn, N.Y., native, she told me she grew up in a multicultural neighborhood and because of that, was fortunate to have learned five languages. She was proud of her Italian heritage.

From the time she was a child, she painted, taught art, wrote stories and entered writing contests. When she was 11, she wrote a story that was published in Atlantic Monthly. She was paid 25 cents a line for that piece, she said.

Jennie majored in English literature in college and became a freelance writer. She covered Dodgers baseball games for the Brooklyn Eagle and New York Journal American.

She married, and during World War II worked for the U.S. Department of War.

She moved to Maine with her husband in 1956. He died 11 years before I met her.

I’m not sure how our correspondence began, but I think she sent me a thank-you note for the story I wrote about her, and I wrote back to answer some questions she’d asked. Then she wrote to me. And I wrote back.

This went on for years, and we got to know each other pretty well through our letters. I admired her sharp wit, descriptive writing, and ability to persevere when she was very sick and when her hands hurt so much she could barely write.

Most of all, I appreciated her friendship. At various times, each of us suffered illnesses and losses, disappointments and sadnesses. We shared all of this in our letters. We also swapped news of happy events, discussed books we had read and urged each other to see particular movies. We always sent each other Christmas and birthday cards.

Jennie and I were very fond of each other. We discovered throughout the years that we had much in common, not the least of which was that my father also was a painter and he and Jennie were born not only on the same day, but also in the same year.

A few years ago, Jennie moved to an assisted living center. I continued to visit her just before Christmas every year, bringing her a present or two and always, some books. We were happy to spend some rare, in-person time together.

But our relationship really blossomed through writing letters, a tradition we both appreciated and one that I’m afraid has lost popularity in this age of email.

When I got a message from a social worker this summer that Jennie had been moved to a nursing home, I intended to visit her, but time got away from me and I never made it.

One day a friend of Jennie’s called to say she had died. There would be no funeral, no gathering.

I kicked myself for not going to see her, but ultimately reasoned that it was OK. She was thinking of me when she asked the woman to call me, and of course, I was thinking of her. I’m sure she knew that. The woman who called said she loved getting my letters.

And you know I loved yours, too, Jennie. Have a good time in heaven, my friend. Read lots of books. And I promise to bring you some when I get there.

Amy Calder has been a Morning Sentinel reporter 23 years. Her column appears here Saturdays. She may be reached at [email protected]