With thee conversing I forget all time,
All seasons and their change, all please alike. 
Sweet is the breath of morn, her rising sweet,
With charm of earliest Birds; pleasant the Sun
When first on this delightful Land he spreads
His orient Beams, on herb, tree, fruit, and flow’r,
Glist’ring with dew; fragrant the fertile earth 
After soft showers; and sweet the coming on
Of grateful Ev’ning mild, then silent Night
With this her solemn Bird and this fair Moon,
And these the Gems of Heav’n, her starry train:
But neither breath of Morn when she ascends
With charm of earliest Birds, nor rising Sun
On this delightful land, nor herb, fruit, flow’r,
Glist’ring with dew, nor fragrance after showers,
Nor grateful Ev’ning mild, nor silent Night
With this her solemn Bird, nor walk by Moon, 
Or glittering Star-light without thee is sweet.

Paradise Lost 4.639-656

I met Alice Woodworth on Tuesday, June 18, 1974 at about 8:30 p.m. on the terrace of Spencer residence hall at Mary Baldwin College (now Mary Baldwin University). About ten days ago Alice Woodworth Campbell and I took our son Ian and our daughter Genevieve (Jenny) to see that place, the very place, an original place. Their origin, eventually, though Alice Woodworth and I did not embark upon our romance until several years later.

More precisely: three years, one month, and three weeks later.

On that day, with the encouragement of Karen Baldwin (thank you, thank you, Karen Baldwin), Alice Woodworth appeared at the ninth reunion of that 1974 summer school. I had arrived at the reunion the night before. Then on Saturday, August 7, 1977, I drove from the place I was staying to the site of the day’s festivities, parked my car, and walked to the spot where everyone had gathered.

And there was Alice Woodworth, sitting beneath a tree.

Alice had appeared briefly at the Richmond reunion in 1974, but not since. We had not been in contact at all during the intervening years, with the exception of a friendly postcard or two. But on this day, there she was, unexpectedly and overwhelmingly there. In that moment of surprise, I knew something had come over me, but I didn’t know what that meant. All I knew was that it would be a fine thing indeed to go say hello to Alice Woodworth, and catch up with her after three years.

And so our conversation began.

My dear friend Steve Chu made a photograph of that beginning. It’s rare to have such a document, an image of the beginning of a life together. (Thank you, thank you, Steve Chu.) It’s rarer still to remember knowing, in that very moment you can see in this very image of Alice Woodworth and Gardner Campbell well into their third or fourth hour of conversation on August 7, 1977, that something had happened. But I did know it, right then, and I knew it on April 22, 1978, when I asked Alice if she would marry me, and I knew it on July 14, 1979, when my April question and her April yes became our July vows.

And I still know it today: 47 years after our first meeting, 43 years after our betrothal, 42 years after our marriage.

44 years after the moment documented below, an image of a moment from my first conversation with the love of my life.

Happy anniversary, Alice.