A perfect match – Lou and Dot’s story
Often with matches, it’s all about timing and a bit of luck, and for Lou and Dot, this couldn’t be truer.
Dot lives in a small, close-knit town in central Victoria, where she raised her family and spent years at the heart of the community. But over time, friends moved away or passed on, and the days grew quieter. “Some days I don’t talk to anyone except the cat,” she said.
After three months of searching-online ads, posters, every avenue tried-it seemed like a volunteer visitor just wasn’t going to happen. Then Lou, from a town just 15 minutes away, put her hand up.
And just like that, everything changed. Dot says “we can talk for hours about everything and anything. It’s just an easy friendship, I don’t think of Lou as my volunteer, she’s my friend. My family’s wonderful, but they’re busy and I feel bad taking up their time running me around to appointments. With Lou, I feel like I can breathe. We go out, we’re not in a rush, we take our time, we chat, and we laugh – a lot! We’ve been to a fare few places, we started sitting at the kitchen table, now we try to get out to the local cafes. It’s something I really look forward to”.
For Lou, who recently made a tree change, time with Dot is a window into the community and its history. There’s always a story-about the river, the people, or the town itself. “She’s incredible,” Lou says. “Whenever I mention something I’ve heard about, I find out she’s either on the committee or been on the committee. She’s inspiring, and I’m not the only one who thinks so. Dot was chosen to be the first person in Victoria and second in Australia to have groundbreaking heart surgery, coming out of it even stronger. I feel like I get way more out of this match then Dot does”.
Dot doesn’t agree. She enjoys their friendship so much and is thankful that Lou chooses to spend her spare time with her. What they do agree on is this: it couldn’t have been a better match if it were made to order. It was simply meant to be.