It was 1962. He was too shy to ask her out, she thought he was funny and wished he would. They lived separate lives for five decades.
Then former classmates Stanley Senk, 70, and Jackie Ginelewicz, 71, met again at their 50th New Britain High School Reunion.
A friend urged her to attend the reunion. “You might meet somebody,” she said.
Stanley, an outgoing class clown-type, was taking photographs of each table at the Indian Hill Country Club, when he caught sight of his high school crush.
Jackie accepted his invitation to dance that night not expecting to be swept off her feet.
The fact that he was living in Maryland and she in Connecticut would have posed an obstacle for any other couple, but not them. Stanley, a supervisor with US Airways, flew up one morning soon after the reunion just to take Jackie out for brunch.
“She was giggling constantly and so happy she could cry,” a close friend said.
Jackie moved to Maryland where they were married.
“I had absolutely no intention of ever marrying again,” said Stanley.
“The more time I spent with Jackie the more I realized that the good Lord watches over me. Whatever door closes for me, he’s always opened another one,” he said.
They honeymooned in Paris.
“She’s one hot chick,” says Stanley, before taking on a more serious tone. “She’s fun to be with. She’s my life.”
From a story by Erica Schmitt in the Newington Town Crier, Newington, Connecticut.
