A Century of Family, Friendship & Adventure  ~ Celebrating 100 Years of Mial Stensland

One hundred years.

It is difficult to fit that much life into a story. A century holds thousands of ordinary days that, when put together, become something extraordinary—a lifetime of family, friendships, hard work, adventures, celebrations, losses, laughter, and memories.

Today, we have the privilege of celebrating 100 years of Mial Stensland. And if there is one thing that becomes clear when you sit down and listen to Mial tell the stories of his life, it is that a good life is built around the people you share it with.

Over the years, friends came into Mial’s life. Some stayed for decades, while others were lost along the way. Each brought something different. Mial believes good friends give us different perspectives on life, and after 100 years, he understands better than most just how valuable those relationships can be.

But at the center of everything has always been family.

When asked about the best decades of his life, Mial remembers the years of raising a family among the very best—the busy years when there were children to feed, work to be done, bills to pay, and seemingly never enough hours in the day. At the time, those years may have felt like a lot of work.

Looking back, they became some of the best years of all.

Mial remembers gathering cattle and working on the ranch endlessly. There were cattle pots to load, another fence to fix, another well to repair.

And then there were the campers. Lots of campers. Over the years, Mial and his family had 18 different campers, eventually working their way up to a beautiful motorhome. Traveling south during the winters became part of life, bringing its own collection of adventures and stories.

But when Mial talks about camping, the most important part wasn’t the camper or even the destination. It was the time together.

Camping brought the Stensland family closer. It taught the children how to travel, how to make their own fun, and how to enjoy simply being together. Those trips created the kind of memories that stay with a family long after the camper is parked for the last time.

As the years passed, Mial watched his family grow. Children became adults. Grandchildren arrived. Babies he once held grew up and began creating lives and families of their own. He has watched bright young minds develop from childhood to adulthood, continually reflecting just how time passes.

He remembers special moments and surprises, including learning that another baby, was coming into the family. And with every new generation came more personalities, more unique names, more gatherings—and certainly more stories for Mial to tell.

A century of life also means witnessing an almost unimaginable amount of change. Mial was born into a world that looked very different from the one we live in today.

He has lived through changes in transportation, medicine, farming, communication and technology that would have seemed impossible when he was a boy. And now, after 100 years of figuring out cattle, semis, campers, family and life itself, Mial occasionally finds himself up against a particularly stubborn modern-day challenge:

Siri on the iPad. “She just quit responding to me on my iPad, can one of the caregivers come get her back to working for me?”

Apparently, even after a century of accumulated wisdom, there are some things that simply refuse to cooperate.

Mial’s 100 years have not all been easy ones. He has watched people he loves face illness. He has experienced his own painful trips to doctors and dentists. He has worried about children, grandchildren, friends and family members. Because you don’t reach 100 years without knowing both joy and heartache. You don’t love people for that long without experiencing both the happiness of having them and the pain of worrying about or losing them. Yet when Mial reflects on what really matters after all these years, his answer isn’t about the things he owned, the miles he traveled, the cattle he gathered, the semis he drove or even those 18 campers.

It comes back to something much simpler.

Family.

Mial believes having a good family is the foundation of life. And perhaps that is one of the greatest pieces of wisdom a man can give us after living for an entire century. A good life isn’t necessarily measured by how easy it was. It is measured by the people who sat beside you through it. The person you shared decades of marriage with. The children you raised. The grandchildren and generations you watched grow. The friends who became like family. The people who showed up during the difficult times. And the people who, even after all these years, still walk through the door just to sit down beside you, visit for a while, laugh about old stories, and make a few new memories.

Today, here at Heartland Senior Living, we aren’t simply celebrating another birthday.

We are celebrating Mial Stensland. We are celebrating 100 years of a life well lived. One hundred years of working and learning. Of cattle and campers. Semis and road trips. Children and grandchildren. Anniversaries and birthdays. Old friends and new ones. Hard work and adventure. Laughter and worry. Loss and love. And thousands upon thousands of ordinary days that, when placed together, created one extraordinary life!

Most of us will never know what it feels like to look backward across an entire century. But today, we are fortunate enough to know someone who can.

So perhaps the best way we can honor Mial’s 100 years isn’t simply to count them.

It is to listen to his stories. To laugh at the good ones. To remember the people who helped make them. To recognize the family that grew from them. And to carry a little of the wisdom Mial gathered along the way into our own lives!

Happy 100th Birthday, Mial Stensland, from your family, your friends, and all of us at Heartland Senior Living.

One hundred years is an extraordinary milestone!

But even more extraordinary is the family, friendships, memories and stories that filled those years!

What a privilege it is to celebrate your first century with you, Mial—and to be part of the story you’re still writing.

By: Jesika Floyd, Co-Owner Heartland Senior Living