Thetford
And because he would often rather be at home on weekends, his friend, Brian Doubleday, made it his mission to drag Williams to social events and double dates — including a Dartmouth College hockey game on Williams’ 17th birthday in 1964 — to try to get Williams out of his shell.
At the game, Williams said, his life changed for the better. Looking across the ice, he noticed Hanover High student Kathy McQueen sitting in the opposing stands.
“We just locked eyes and we just kept staring at each other and looking at each other,” Williams remembered.
McQueen and a friend eventually made their way to Williams’ seat, and he worked up the courage to ask for her number.
“I don’t know who won the game. I don’t remember anything about the game or anything else that happened,” he said.
But he said that game and encounter marked the highlight of his high school life. It was an event that led to a lifelong friendship between the two that survived a move to Arizona, marriages, children and came full circle about a year ago when they reconnected and decided to marry.
In McQueen’s Thetford living room before Thanksgiving, Justice of the Peace Cathee Clement married the two some 52 years after the hockey game.
“That morning my hibiscus bloomed. One bloom, and David put it in my hair,” said McQueen, who has since changed her last name to Williams.
“Not long after their engagement last year, Kathy and David decided they could no longer be anything but married,” declared an announcement in the newspaper they placed as an advertisement. “As though the force of being apart for 51 years demanded that they wed, they were more than happy to finalize their re-union.”
David didn’t know that by calling Kathy after the hockey game, he would set the wheels in motion to fall in love. He didn’t even know whether she would agree to go on a date.
“I had like a flow chart,” he said. No matter what she could say, the teenage David mapped out an answer on paper before the call, not sure what to expect.
“That’s the life of a shy person,” he said.
The two began to date soon after. Driving his father’s Chevy Nova from Woodstock to Hanover, he took her to movies, dinners and her junior prom — his first and only time at a high school dance.
“We didn’t stay too long because we didn’t dance a lot, but we just wanted to be together,” she said.
“She was helping me get out of my shell, actually,” he remembered.
But only four months into their relationship, David’s family picked up and moved to Tucson, Ariz. His father was a music director at the First Congregational Church of Woodstock and had been warning the family that he might take a job at another church elsewhere in the United States. The news still came as a shock.
“I didn’t really get to say ‘goodbye’ to Kathy or anything like that,” he said. “It was all pretty sudden.”
Kathy said the move was “devastating” for her and she didn’t really understand why it was happening.
But the two continued their correspondence after the move. Scattered phone calls and an annual birthday card became the norm as the two continued on with their lives.
He enrolled in the University of Arizona, got a four-year degree in psychology and took on a number of jobs before settling into work as a regulator licensing the state’s mental health clinics and residential units for those recovering from substance abuse. He also got married and had four children.
She also married, had a daughter and divorced. She also took on “odd jobs” before settling into health care, founding Kathy’s Caregivers and harnessing a love of horses to start McQueen’s Tack Shop in Thetford.
“I had to choose between my husband and David really, and David was in Arizona,” Kathy said. “I had sent him a Dear John letter and he never received it, which is good I guess.”
But even with some correspondence, the two lived their separate lives until 2013. That’s when David retired, followed shortly by the death of his ex-wife and his mother’s dementia diagnosis. Feeling saddened by those events and as though something were missing, he sent Kathy “the letter” asking how she was and inviting her to meet in Boston under the guise of visiting his adult son.
“I just couldn’t believe it,” she said. He had told her once before that he was planning a Boston trip but those plans fell through.
The two met again in January of 2015 and immediately renewed old feelings. To test the romance, they also stayed together for a week.
“Within a few days we knew … and so after a week, I flew back and started to make arrangements … to make this happen,” he said.
After three more trips, he moved to Thetford and they were married. The two now live happily together making up for the more than five decades apart.
Doubleday, David’s old friend, also tried to stay in touch with both of them but lost track of David. He got a call from Kathy last spring and told her that he was having trouble reaching his high school classmate.
“He’s right here. You want to speak to him?” he remembered her replying.
When they told me they were seeing each other, “I just had a smile on my face for the whole week,” Doudleday said, adding that he intends to visit the couple this summer.
Since placing the announcement in the paper, David said, he frequently is surprised that people will recognize them. He said people have approached them in parking lots, movie theaters and even at the West Lebanon Wal-Mart.
“I think that there’s so many people, especially when you get older, you have wishes and hopes for your past life and missing out on love,” David said. “That strikes a chord with people. It’s an amazing thing.”
Tim Camerato can be reached at tcamerato@vnews.com or 603-727-3223.