Those three words — along with “always treat people as you want to be treated” and “help when you can” — are words to live by that Rachel Inez Belshaw hopes her 4 year-old great-great-granddaughter Neveah Samamiego takes to heart.

Belshaw has banked on those basic tenants to help guide her through the good and the bad.

It’s advice that Belshaw has learned by embracing and living life.

And Belshaw knows what she is talking about.

She turns 105 years-old on Sunday.

Her extended family at Calvary Community Church is conducting a birthday party in her honor after Sunday’s 10 a.m. service.

She’s hoping they will be serving her favorite white cake with strawberries along with vanilla ice cream.

It probably doesn’t matter one way or another in the overall scheme of things.

Belshaw is happy to be alive.

It’s a mindset she learned the hard way from resilience in dealing with daunting challenges at age 6 and again at age 50.

The first time it was from a venomous bite to her leg, when as a youngster she slammed a front yard gate agitating a rattlesnake seeking respite from the Texas sun in a cattle guard.

The second time it was battling breast cancer.

“My dad came running and put his mouth (to the wound) and got as much of the poison out as he could,” Belshaw recalled of the snake bite.

It was touch and go for both as there was a worry about her dad having ingested some of the venom as well.

As for Belshaw, they were miles from the nearest doctor.

Days later when her condition still teetered on the threshold of death, the family had visitors.

“The entire church stood in front of our house and prayed,” Belshaw recalled.

Shortly thereafter, Belshaw was on the road to recovery.

She ended up being in the care of the Scottish Rite Children’s Hospital until age 13.

Belshaw was unable to start school until she was 9 but managed to eventually earn a Bachelors’ degree at North Texas Teachers College when college degrees were an extreme rarity.

Starting school several years late was a challenge and had Belshaw — who rode a horse to school — wondering how she would fit in given the aftermath of the snake bite shortened her leg that is now 2 inches shorter and almost 100 years later would force her to be dependent on a wheelchair.

The first day when kids were playing ball they insisted she join in.

“People helped me,” she said of classmates, teachers, and others.

Born in Texas and

moved to California

Belshaw was born in the East Texas town of Meridian on June 28, 1921.

She was one of nine children of John and Julia Raines.

After graduating from North Texas, she landed her first job as a food and nutrition teacher as well as a school dietician in Freeport, Texas.

She met her future husband — David — at a USO Dance near coastal Texas. It was 1951 and he was a sailor in the Navy at the height of the Korean War.

The skills he learned in the Navy as a tool and die maker helped him secure a job at a shipyard in Alameda. Belshaw went to work as a dietician at an Alameda hospital.

The move to California was a big change for the Texas farm kid.

“California was so big, I didn’t feel I belonged here,” Belshaw said. “It took time to get settled but I did thanks to my wonderful husband.”

And although Texas-style cooking reminds her of home, she noted California and specifically Manteca is her home today.

“Both are good places,” she said of Texas and California.

Belshaw and her husband started the family in Hayward. They eventually had two daughters; Catherine Jones, the oldest, and Joan Norton.

“It was wonderful,” Belshaw said of giving birth and raising children.

Belshaw “never in a minute” thought she’d one day be sitting in the living room of the home of her first born, who is now 69, and talking about her approaching 105th birthday as she was doing Thursday afternoon.

It is family that prompted Belshaw to move from Hayward to Manteca in 1995.

Manteca is home to four generations of her family.

In addition to two daughters, Belshaw has four grandkids, four great-grandkids and one great-great-grandchild born when she was 100.

When she turned 100 in 2021, she remembered thinking to herself, “oh my goodness, I really made it.”

Her favorite things to do are attend school functions of her great-grandkids, church activities, and watching parades.

Belshaw missed Manteca’s Fourth of July last year but is hoping she might be able to see this year’s edition on Saturday.

She also keeps tabs on current events, noting the tragedy in Venezuela where dual earthquakes struck this week is a daunting challenge, but it won’t knock people down.

“They will rebuild it,” Belshaw said, echoing how she stayed focused on the future when two personal calamities — poisonous rattlesnake bite and cancer — could have derailed her life.

Belshaw’s embracement of a truism she offered, “this too shall pass,” is rooted not just in personal adversity but a lifetime so far that has included the Great Depression, World War II, the COVID-19 pandemic and a host of other challenges.

“Through my faith I think that tomorrow will be better,” Belshaw said. “I will get over this.”

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com