Don’t wait for the perfect replacement for a deceased spouse – a duplicate – to come along. Seek companionship when you feel the time is right, not according to someone else’s agenda.

That’s how one couple feels about finding someone else, falling in love and getting remarried after a spouse died. The story of this Roanoke Valley pair could probably be a case study for other people looking at life after the loss of a long-time spouse. It’s a story of love that bloomed while looking for a friend and companionship, a sharing of interests and a new phase in life.

Lucy Reed calls her husband John “a Renaissance man” who likes wood turning and blacksmithing as hobbies, not to mention home building. A domed house he built years ago in Catawba led to a story in The Roanoke Times. He recently sold it to his son and put up a smaller home nearby that he now shares with Lucy.

John Reed and Lucy Phillips married last August. He had been widowed for several years after cancer claimed wife Marlene following 45 years of marriage. Lucy was widowed for six years after her second husband of 22 years (Frank) died of complications from Alzheimer’s.

Lucy and John both subscribe to the theory that sitting in a rocking chair worrying about advanced age can’t be healthy. They met casually at a luncheon sponsored by an informal singles group.

After running into each other at a series of events John, a “farm boy from Indiana” finally asked Lucy, “a city girl from New York” to a lecture at Virginia Tech, and things went from there.

“We had to go in my pickup truck,” John recalls with a chuckle. “Lucy had never been in a pickup truck.”

His deceased wife Marlene was also from Indiana and more attuned to a rural life, he said.

“He laughs at me with my New York accent,” said Lucy, “but I think that’s one of the things that attracted us to each other – our backgrounds are so completely different.” Nevertheless they do share a love of culture and the arts. They’re both music lovers: she has a collection of more than 500 compact discs; he plays piano and even used to perform (and sing) for her over the phone while they were dating.

John’s other hobbies also keep him out of her hair (and often in the garage), allowing them to have their own space when they need it. Some of the wooden bowls John has turned out are on sale at the Art on a Mission store at Tanglewood Mall.

John’s mother is 98 years of age and Lucy’s two grown children tease her about having a mother-in-law at her age. She admits only to being as old as Grace Kelly and Audrey Hepburn while John just turned 73.

“I never expected at this stage of my life to get married again, but we just enjoy each other’s company very much,” Lucy said. “We really care about each other and are good company for each other.”

John said there’s no timetable for a proper grieving period after the loss of a spouse, and he knows that the feelings of family members are somewhere in the mix. But it was family and friends that finally told him he “was waiting to find another Marlene,” John said. “We did discuss the difference between grieving and loneliness. I did not have a schedule for dating and remarrying. It just happened.”

Once in a while he hears about someone who can’t get past the loss of a spouse or another loved one. He says that’s a person’s own choosing.

“You can grieve the rest of your life if you want to or you can get over it. There’s no rule. That’s up to the individual,” John said.

John doesn’t think Marlene would have wanted him to grieve for too long. Their grown children were happy that John and Lucy found each other. Lucy believes the relationship eased the minds of children on both sides.

“Children worry about parents over a certain age being alone,” she said.

John feels some grown children object to a late life spouse because they believe that inheritance money may be squandered. He said, with a smile: “I’ve told my kids for years I’m going to spend every penny I have before I die.”

Grieving for a deceased spouse can take many forms and it doesn’t necessarily entail crying every day, Lucy said.

“You never forget the other person, because they were in your life so many years. But you go on and do things to distract you and keep you from getting depressed. You just go on,” she said.

Falling in love wasn’t on her agenda either, after losing Frank. She was satisfied with having a handful of good lady friends to do things with but also contends that “it’s never too late. You can love someone even if you had a previous spouse that died.”

John Reed says remarriage was also a surprise to him. He had moved out of the big house (on 27 acres of land) into the smaller one that matched his new bachelor lifestyle. The former owner of Curry Copy Center in downtown Roanoke said he had “no intention of remarrying – but those things happen.”

He was looking for some companionship and thinks “the worst thing in the world is eating out alone.” He had tried it by himself following church one day after Marlene had passed away.

“It was miserable. It was no fun to do these things alone,” he said.

Matrimony, when neither expected it, has been a revelation.

“I realize that there are episodes in life. All of us go through that,” said Lucy, who was also married for more than 20 years to her first husband who died of a heart attack. She relates her experiences to the chapters of a book.

“I’ve had different lifetimes.”