Published: April 24, 2008 10:10 am            

Encounter leads to lifelong friendships

My wife, Vaunene, (V.H., in the copyright material) and I were on honeymoon 18 years ago this week.

After a limo ride Saturday night from Russell Springs to the Gratz Park Inn in Lexington, Sunday mass at the cathedral and a downtown carriage ride at dusk Sunday evening, we headed east Monday morning and wound up at a bed and breakfast in Toano (I think), Virginia.

A lady we’ll never forget, June Cottell, and her husband, Ed, hosted us there for about three days while we explored Colonial Williamsburg and the surroundings — Yorktown, and lots of historical sites.

She gave us hot chocolate chip cookies every evening and the most delectable breakfasts in the world.

Ed was a retired lightning rod salesman. They’d converted their home to a hostelry for families who wished to stay in a home-like atmosphere. June and Ed became not only providers of lodging and breakfast, but fast friends.

We returned several summers in the early years of our marriage. June would call on birthdays and anniversaries, just as she called one Monday night.

We got word that Ed had died, not in a lightning strike, but a stroke, I think.

We went back that summer for a few days.

Then we got word then that June had met Roger Young and they married. They gave up the B&B and moved to Hayes, Virginia on the southern part of the Delmarva Peninsula. We visited them a few years ago, soon after their marriage. That trip took us across northern North Carolina, then up the Delmarva to Annapolis, where we ate soft-shell crab and other area seafood, toured the Naval Academy and then stopped in Washington, D.C. for a few days.

We went to the Korean War Memorial, the FDR Memorial and other places and ended the trip with an interview with Senator Wendell Ford, the last Senate leader from Kentucky who could ever compare with Alben W. Barkley, a great Senate leader and Vice President from Kentucky.

Somewhere around the house is one of the “official” Senate photos of Ford and the two of us. Our last stop was to be the “Newseum” in Alexandria, Va., but the driver (I) forgot to stop and we didn’t realize it until we had arrived at the Woodrow Wilson home. Oh, well …

June, Ed and Roger have become, and became, very close friends. Even though we rarely see them and hear from them once or twice a year, we love them as if they are and were our own family.

They’ve celebrated with us and mourned with us. We saw our family members die, just as we mourned with June for Ed. They took care of us and still care for us.

Isn’t it interesting how a random meeting, a clean bedroom with a soft bed and a good hearty breakfast can make for good friends?

Maybe we can go back to Hayes this summer or fall. Maybe we can renew our friendship and have a good breakfast and a soft bed. I hope so. It’s good to meet with old friends.



© MMVIII, V.H. & C.K. Greene

        

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