Danny Ward, 68, is from Forres, north-east Scotland. Nancy Illing, 62, lives in Chicago. They met in 2017 on a train
Danny and Nancy laugh a lot – big, wholehearted, body-shaking laughter at things that don’t even seem funny, but with a joy they can’t contain. They sit on the sofa, squished together. Danny had proposed to Nancy a few weeks earlier. A series of small events ensured they met in September 2017, on a train from San Francisco to Chicago. Danny, who had been travelling in the US, messed up his ticket booking, which meant he was on the same train as Nancy. She had been on a trip with two of her sisters and wanted to fly to Chicago but couldn’t get a seat. Nancy’s third sister hadn’t wanted to go on the trip, which meant there was a space at the table in the dining car at which the waiter seated Danny. “I said, ‘Do you ladies mind if I join you?’” says Danny. “Nancy looked up and said, ‘It would be our pleasure.’ Within five minutes she had me laughing.”
“When he came to sit with us I just wanted him to feel comfortable,” Nancy says. “Then he entertained us all night long with lovely stories. He told the most delightful stories about his wife and I thought that anybody who thought that well of his wife would treat any woman wonderfully.”
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