Spending time with Joy Goldblatt, you can see how she cares for other people. Even her connection with The Jewish Pavilion.
Since she moved into Allegro Winter Park three years ago, she has been a regular at The Jewish Pavilion’s services and events.
“Susan is very knowledgeable and very interesting, and with the organization making the effort to be here, I want to support them,” Goldblatt says.
It’s that kind of heart that Joy has shown throughout her life.
In college at the University of Connecticut, she studied to be a dietician and used that to help people eat healthier. After her children were born, she took care of them and volunteered at their schools as the class mother and more.
She took care of her parents when they needed her the most and as her husband’s health started failing a few years ago, she took care of him.
“After a lifetime of Ron driving us around, I became the driver,” she says. “I’m always concerned about the people around me.”
Joy’s path to Winter Park is like so many others in Central Florida’s senior communities. She and her husband Ron lived in the home they built for 30 years in East Hannover, New Jersey. Ron was a high school teacher.
“Ron always said he would never move to Florida, but after three years of the worst winter weather, he had had enough,” she says.
In 1994, the two moved to Palm City in Martin County to a new 55+ community, building a new home they lived in for almost another 30 years, moving to Allegro when Ron’s health started failing. He passed away three months after the move.
Today, Joy, who is 90 years old, spends her time playing chair volleyball and participating in the community’s activities and trips. She moved to Allegro to be closer to her son and daughter-in-law, Jeffery and Lisa, who live in Oviedo and were founding members of Temple Shir Shalom in Oviedo. Her daughter, Debbie, lives in New Jersey today.
She still can go to temple with Jeffery, but she doesn’t miss any of The Jewish Pavilion’s services at Allegro.
“If they come to see us, I will always be there,” Joy says.