I thought I’d share with you how I met my second wife. If you remember, I mentioned that my mother-in-law had told me that a man needs a woman in his life and had been encouraging me to date. I was working for the University of Pennsylvania. Specifically, I was working for the Moore School of Electrical Engineering at their Valley Forge Research Center. An side: The Valley Forge Research Center no longer exists. The University of Pennsylvania sold the land and buildings. Back to my quest: Which at first was just to satisfy my mother-in-law that I was looking for “a woman.” You would think that living in an area like Philadelphia would mean there were plenty of opportunities to meet women. There was obviously the bar scene, but I was never into that whole idea of finding the correct kind of bar – sports, upscale, or whatever. I was at a loss to know where to look. Someplace, I found an ad for a dating service. It asked a series of questions about what you enjoyed and who you enjoyed being with and so on. By today’s standards, it was ridiculously inexpensive. I think it was five dollars. I’m sure the answers were turned into punchcards and you are simply matched that way. There turned out to be quite a few women. I had dated several and was dating a schoolteacher I had met through the dating service pretty regularly. This was the days before email and you got a phone number and an address. My wife just moved from the address the dating company had sent me and she drop me a note via snail mail. At first, I kind of dismissed her because she was approximately 50 miles west of where I was living at the research center, but we did exchange letters and phone calls. It was only later that I realized the schoolteacher I was dating was in a Philadelphia suburb quite a distance from me and using express roads it was a 60 some mile drive to her place. I’m sure if I could’ve cut across-country and through the city, it it would’ve been shorter, but it was quicker using roads like the Pennsylvania Turnpike. I became more and more intrigued through our telephone calls with my current wife. We finally met face-to-face in the middle of the summer and married later that October which was 49 years ago.
