Sunday Mirror (Northern Ireland)
HOW COVID LED TO REKINDLING OF TEEN LOVE AFFAIR A stash of old letters from 30 years ago reignited my feelings for 1st love.. now we’re married
EXCLUSIVE
A STASH of passionate letters has reignited a couple’s romance 30 years on – turning “first love” into marriage, decades after distance tore them apart.
When Kate and Guenther Baer met on holiday in Torquay in 1989 it sparked a connection they kept alive for two years, despite her living in Yorkshire and him in Germany.
Kate, then 17, recalls: “I saw him across the room of a pub and there was an instant spark. He reminded me of the keyboard player from a-ha, who I had a massive crush on.”
They chatted and 23-year-old Guenther asked Kate on a date. She says: “We went for a coffee, then took a walk along Torquay Pier. I was smitten straight away.
“Guenther was tall, handsome, kind and interesting. The date ended in a kiss and I felt like I was already falling in love.”
Bavarian Guenther had to return to Germany the very next day.
But the pair began a two-year romance, kept alive through letters, phone calls and a handful of visits.
Kate says: “Guenther and I were first loves – he was the first man I slept with, the first man I ever cared about.
“We were love’s young dream. I felt I’d met my soulmate, and so did he.”
Guenther flew back to the UK twice the following year to stay with art student Kate, and she joined him and his family for two weeks that October.
She said: “We climbed Hochgern, the huge mountain at the back of his house, and professed our love.
“It was the most romantic day. We even got professional photos of us together to keep.”
But in the spring of 1991, after Guenther’s efforts to move to the UK to be with Kate failed, the still-smitten pair felt they had no hope.
Kate admits: “I was the one who said we had to call it a day and move on.
“The distance had become too much of an obstacle. But I was completely heartbroken.
“We wrote for a further two years. He ended every letter with, ‘I still love you’.
“We sent more than 100 letters but had only met three times, spending just five weeks together.”
In time, Kate and Guenther both met new partners and married.
But Kate, who wed in 2002 aged 30, says she never truly got over her first love. She says: “I was happy, but my heart was always locked away for Guenther. I just felt that’s how everyone feels about your first love.”
In 2006, Kate began a make-up business specialising in bridal styling and working with celebrities.
But as that grew her marriage crumbled, and she divorced in 2009.
Guenther’s marriage also ended
His words were lyrical, passionate and sincere. I had to find him again KATE BAER ON RE-READING LOVE LETTERS 30 YEARS ON
– but they had long since lost touch.
Kate gave up on romance to focus on work. She says: “I had great friends, loved my job and consigned myself to be happily single.”
But when the pandemic hit and all her work stopped in the second lockdown, Kate began feeling low.
She said: “It was November 2020. I decided to get my Christmas decorations out to cheer myself up.
“I pulled down a box from my wardrobe and out poured Guenther’s love letters – about 50 of them. My heart skipped a beat and all my old feelings flooded back.”
She put the letters in date order, poured a glass of wine and spent the night curled up reading them.
She recalls: “In a funny way, Covid was my Cupid. I’d completely forgotten about that box. The letters are so beautiful, so touching.
“Guenther would write about his plans to come to England to be with me, and how certain situations made him think of me.
“There were love poems and declarations of adoration. His words were lyrical, passionate and sincere. It was overwhelming reading them.”
In one, Guenther wrote of walking barefoot in the summer rain as a little boy, trampling in the puddles.
He told Kate: “When the late sun came up and the rain warmed me, there was nothing more exciting.
“Whenever I’m with you, I can feel it again. You make me very happy and even more. You are the sun that makes me feel that I live.”
One poem to her says: “The smell
of your body in the morning, your hair lying gently on the pillow, a little smile in your yawning, your eyes like a mirror, touching your body with my lips, all I want is you, on my face your fingertips, I wish it could now be true.”
On her one visit, Kate left Guenther her camisole top, doused in her perfume. He would hold it each time he wrote to her. Even after they broke up, he wrote of the fading smell of her perfume. Kate said: “Reading all these letters, I felt an enormous sense of loss – of the greatest love of my life, and of what could have been.
“It was so clear how much we loved one another. When I got to the letter where it said the smell of the perfume is fading, it was very poignant. I needed to know where the man I had loved this much was now. I needed to see him.”
But Guenther was not on social media, so Kate wrote to his brother Andreas, whose address she still had. Days later, she got a call from a
German number. Holding back tears, she answered… and heard his voice.
Kate says: “I recognised it at once, and his laugh. In seconds, it was like the last 30 years never happened.
“I felt like a giddy teenager. All I wanted was to tell him I loved him – and always had. It took just a week before we both said ‘I love you’.”
After eight weeks of daily video calls, Guenther flew to the UK.
Kate said: “We hugged straight away – and the moment we got in my car at the airport we enjoyed our first kiss and cuddle for over 30 years.”
Guenther, who works in IT, revealed he had tried tracing Kate under her maiden name but got nowhere.
He said: “I only gave up a month before. Suddenly my brother handed me this letter. I was overwhelmed – and even more so when I saw her again. I remember it was a really sunny day and I thought, ‘She’s made the sun shine for me again’.
“When we met it was amazing, she was an even better version of herself. She is so caring, thoughtful and strong-minded.”
Guenther worked from Yorkshire for three months as they rekindled the relationship. He then returned home for work and to see family and his three grown-up children.
In August he proposed on the same mountain they had climbed as youngsters. Kate said: “It was the best moment of my life.
“He pulled champagne and a beautiful diamond ring from his backpack and got down on one knee, declaring, ‘Distance couldn’t keep us apart, time couldn’t keep us apart. Please be my wife’. Of course I said ‘yes’ at once.”
They wed in December in Guenther’s home town of Unterwössen, and will have a UK ceremony in September.
Kate said: “We walked in to George Michael’s version of The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face. It summed up our story.
“We both shed a tear, but he was much worse than me! Now we just want a peaceful happy ever after at the foot of the mountain. I can’t believe we were apart 30 years.”