My Wife Dalene Rae Nance
We met at Fresno State College back in 1973 after I transfered from Fresno City college. Unlike in the story books where people fall instantly in love, we both looked at each other and thought, anyone else in the room? But magic did happen, and we fell in love and just as the story books had it, that first love was so intense that it was not only a wonder we could spend a moment apart, but more still how we managed to be alive before we met one another. That was 27 years ago and that intense love where we couldn't have spent a moment together has softened into that gentle love of realizing we don't have to be together 24 hours a day but the thought of living our lives without each other is too horrible to contemplate.
Dalene has had a tough life. She has had to go on disability because of the retinitis pigmentosa which has taken away much of her sight and hearing. It would be impossible for her to have stayed in teaching but she still volunteers her time to work in the Lincoln Elementary School in Kingsburg, California where we live. She has to use a special magnifying glass to see the printed words, and she sometimes is unsure as to just which student she has been helping, and may times she has to have the children repeat a request, but she works harder than anyone else I've ever known. And although slower than some, she manages to finish the tasks of the day and come home to keep us all on the straight path.
Even though she can't hear or see everything, she manages to know all that is possible to be known about our two boys. No children are perfect, but neither are there perfect parents, still our boys are growing into fine young men, and they have their mother to thank for that.
And I have more to thank Dalene for than can ever be put into words. Her drive to be a work, live, and love with all the hardships of her disabilites put the petty little difficulties I have in my own life into perspective. She is my hero. Her strength can never been measured in convential ways, but I know, there is no stronger person on this planent. It is my luck to be her husband.
We Have Never Forgotten
That hot August evening
When sweat beaded down your gown
And soaked into the creases in my tux.
Had the day been more pleastant
These twenty-six years might have
Seemed long or hard or even dull.
Thank God we didn't marry in May.