Finding Love When You Least Expect It

Love stories. Yes, a few have appeared on these pages. Especially that of Nancy Lynn and Hal Kessler, whom I interviewed for Valentine’s Day two years ago. Their late love blossomed after a chance encounter at a supermarket – he had been her high school teacher. Fifty years before.

Hal and Nancy's Florida toast, 2013

Of course there was no hanky panky between them way back then. But some latent chemistry eventually brought them together.  Nancy recently wrote me to say that she thinks of me each Valentine’s Day, as I do of them.  They are still together, planning another vacation in Florida.

On Valentine’s Day, it's worthwhile re-reading Sue Carson's story about her relationship with her mother and how, in the end, she learned to love her. "I decided at that moment that I was going to really work at opening up to love,’’ she told me. "I decided I would be a more loving, devoted person, particularly to [my husband] John.  Because I realize he’s my core. He’s who I’m with.  If I can love him more, that’s the place to begin. Some days are easier than others. Some days are hard. But there’s this huge change and shift in my relationship with him." 

Let me end this Valentine’s post with another love story.

In 2012, I reconnected (through my college class reunion) with Becky Burckmyer, who lost the love of her life to death. And then, by trying to heal herself and save her grand old shore home, she opened a Bed and Breakfast that quickly got rave reviews.

And then, doing what she loved, she found love. A longtime friend turned into something more.

“Bobby and I,” she wrote me last week, “are still very much an item: he is living with me in Marblehead now. In March, we rent an apartment in Andover while he coaches crew for three months, then we move to his house in Chatham for the summer and rather than doing B and B, I rent my house, furnished, by the month, for an outrageous price. I just couldn't keep up the work with the B and B--it was doing very well but I was exhausted.

Also a strain on the love affair.”

Thanks to everyone who is reading UnRetiring.  I’ve surpassed 50,000 hits.
 I love having followers who think I have something worthwhile to say.  If you have a love story to  share, please do!!

And to my Larry….I love you!

Love and Laughter a Year Later

How Nancy and Hal celebrated in Naples, Fl.

On Valentine's Day a year ago, I brought you a love story-- a tale that has become the most often-clicked story on my blog.  Hal Kessler and Nancy Florin met in high school. He was a young, enthusiastic history teacher. She was one of his admiring students. One reason, probably, was his hysterical sense of humor. But Nancy and Hal didn't become an item for another 48 years. And, guess what? Some relationships are meant to last.
"We are still together," Hal told me yesterday. "We celebrated my eightieth birthday last October. Nancy and I spent 5 wonderful days in Naples. Thursday we will have dinner at Capital Grill (NJ) to celebrate Valentine's Day. 
"Early in March, we are going to Clearwater to watch the Phillies. I wanted to be the the backup for
Jimmy Rollins, but management could not afford the insurance. The front office kept mumbling
about Octoman's (my alias) fielding ability."

Nancy sent along the photo above, taken in Naples, Fl., "to celebrate Hal's BIG birthday.  It's sunset taken from the Gumbo Limba restaurant at the Ritz Carlton through my cosmo!  Only the best for my teacher and 'babe.'"

Hal and Nancy -- the celebration continues

Love and Laughter Alot Later

Once upon a time, a long long time ago, Nancy Lynn Sagel was 16 years old and a student at Northeast High School in Philadelphia. Hal Kessler was 28 and her history teacher.

“It was 1960 when I met Nancy. She sat in row 7, seat 1,” said Hal. “In addition to being a good student, she was always upbeat even though she was subjected to me as a teacher.”

“He’s funny and warm and that’s the kind of teacher he was,” said Nancy. “Everybody loved him.”

That was the end of the story for many, many years.

Nancy, too, became a teacher. And at age 32, she married Elliot Florin. One day, “he left to play tennis and that was it,” she said. “He died early. He was 53.”  She closed up her Nancy Lynn candy shop in Avalon, N.J., and with the help of  friends, moved on.

After a long marriage, Hal’s wife fell sick and he cared for her for four years until her death in 2008.

But this is a Philadelphia fairy tale and it has a happy ending.

Over the decades, Nancy and Hal would occasionally bump into each other – once at Decatur elementary, where Nancy was teaching.

Hal joked to the staff,  “’One of my former teachers is on the faculty!’ That got a laugh.”

Another time, they ran into each other at a funeral. “He was wearing a light khaki suit. I told my friends, ‘I saw Mr. Kessler today.’ ”

Then, after Hal’s wife died, they bumped into each other at the Genuardi’s market in Rockledge,  about equidistant from his place in Elkins Park and hers in the city.

“It was one of the aisles where they have apple sauce and little packs of fruit,” Hal said.

“You remember that?” Nancy said, as the two told me their story at Le Bus in Manyunk.

“I asked Nancy for her phone number and email and she said, ‘I don’t go out with older men,’” Hal quipped. (He is a jokster… see my earlier blog about a guy who does nothing.)

That was 3 ½ years ago.

Last  September, they went together to Nancy’s 50^th high school reunion.

“He was the class reunion star,” Nancy said.

“Don’t put that in, it’s embarrassing,” he said.

“A lot of people knew; a lot of people didn’t know,” said Nancy, beaming. “It was the topic of conversation.”

What draws them together is their shared love of history, theater, movies, eating out and watching sports. “We’re both home bodies,” said Nancy.

They see each other almost every day, but have no problem doing a lot separately.

“When you find someone late in life,“ you also want to keep your own interests,  said Nancy.  “On Saturday night Hal babysat his grandkids and I went out with my friends. And I’m going with my girlfriends to Las Vegas."

But she’s decided not to go with friends to China for 21 days this spring.

“I can’t be away from him that long,” she said.

Tonight, Valentine’s Day, they plan to dine at Bridget’s steak house in Ambler. Just the two of them.

“I’ll probably have the steak,” said Nancy.

“I’m one of those people who go to steak restaurants and order salmon,” said Hal.

“We feel very comfortable with each other,” said Hal.

“I’ll sum it up better,” said Nancy. “I just adore him.”

“Ditto,” said Hal.

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All about Nothing

 I love what Hal Kessler of Elkins Park wrote in The Philadelphia Inquirer this week. Here it is:

“A woman comes home from work and says to her husband, who is retired, ‘What did you do today?’

‘Nothing,’ he replies.

His wife then raises her voice and says, ‘Damn it, you did nothing yesterday.’

He replies, ‘I know. I wasn’t finished.’

After 52 years of work, I have learned to do nothing. I submit that doing nothing in my case, is a major breakthrough. I thoroughly enjoy doing nothing and view 2012 as an opportunity to continue to do nothing.”

I found Hal doing nothing this afternoon, and he had time to explain why he’s having so much fun.

For 38 years, until 1992, he worked as a teacher and later director of curriculum for the Philadelphia School District. For the next 11, he ran the World Affairs Council’s  Pew-funded project-- Schools of Excellence. Next, he was education director for the HolocaustAwareness Museum  in Northeast Philadelphia.

During much of this time, he said, he actually worked 3 or 4 jobs, -- teaching in the evening, writing reports for a management psychology firm and teaching at Chestnut Hill College.

“One day I said to myself, ‘This is a bit crazy!’ and I cut down to two jobs.”

Now, Hal, 79,  says, “I find I love just not having to watch the clock, though my alarm still goes off at 5 a.m. I have a leisurely breakfast and chart out the day. I have time for my two grandsons, 8 and 9,  and reading and golf.

“I call it nothing because I don’t have a job. That makes it nothing. I do what I want to do. That’s why I’m finding this retirement so great. I don’t have a job, no one to report to, no deadlines to meet.”

I can’t see my way to "nothing" yet.  As my friend, Art Carey, told me today, citing psychologist Martin Seligman, “We need a sense of engagement, of accomplishment. When you leave a career, you leave a source of those things. And then there’s routine. So we need a way to replace those things.”

Hal Kessler would disagree.