This thread is inspired by comments from sixtieschick in the Personal Adds thread. If you asked fifty people, you'd probably get fifty different answers. That's why it's so difficult to set about finding a loving mate. You just never know where you're going to find them.

For me, I had decided that I would never find a woman I'd want to marry, even though I wasn't cynical or bitter about a nightmarish first marriage. I figured I'd just move to Rockford, Illinois when I retired, buy a little house and sit out on the front porch at night playing my banjo. Didn't sound half bad, actually. A Hell of a lot better than my first marriage.

Through a series of completely unlikely occurances in my life, I found myself moving from a Scandinavian heritage Lutheran Church to a black Baptist church across the street. I didn't know more than a half a dozen people there, and those only very casually. After I'd started going there for a couple of months, I started going to bible study on Wednesday nights. I had to leave immediately after the class because it was practice night for my group, so there was no time to socialize with anyone. There was a very aggressive woman in the class who told everyone else that they couldn't sit next to me because "he's mine!" I had never gone out with her, and had no intention of it, but she was a very outspoken woman, and the other women didn't want to tangle with her, so there was always a seat open next to me.

Most Wednesday nights, there was this beautiful woman who always arrived late. She worked in a store and even though she tried to get to class on time, she was usually held up and arrived after the class had started. And of course, all the seats were taken. Except one.
Not realizing that I was already "claimed," she always sat next to me. I introduced myself to her and managed to get in a word or two, but because she came after class started and I had to leave the minute it finished, there was no real way to get to know her. But, after awhile I discovered that she was deeply committed to visiting people in hospitals, nursing homes, and who were confined to their own homes. That's something I'd done much of my life and when she mentioned it, I told her I'd love to go with her some time.

So, the first time we went out, we went to a hospital to visit two people neither of us had ever met, and then went to the home of a woman who was in her upper 90's and bed-ridden. After that, I took her out to supper, and hopped aboard the Loveland Express.

Talk about a pickup line... "Hey baby, you want to go visit an old sick woman in a hospital with me?" Somehow, I have a feeling that wouldn't work on everyone. But, because it was a sincere question with only a little tinge of ulterior motive, it opened a door that will never be closed.

Along the line, I'll tell how my parents met... ended up writing a song about it because I thought it was so humorous..

Jerry