Proof you’re never too old to get married
Octogenarians find love after meeting at independent senior living facility
PALMDALE — Wanda Fox was done with men; Tom Wienke was done with his cat. A year later, the two octogenarians are a married couple.
The couple live at the Holiday Rancho Village independent senior living community in Palmdale. Fox moved there about two years ago. Wienke has lived there for about five years. They met when Fox heard Wienke was looking to re-home his cat, a 13-year-old long-haired calico named Abby. Fox decided she wanted a cat.
“I didn’t know him at all,” she said. Wienke lived on the first floor of their shared building; Fox lived on the third floor. When Fox heard Wienke had a cat, she decided to find out who he was. She tracked him down and offered to adopt the cat, which she did.
“In the process, he would come up once in a while and just maybe have a drink or just talk,” Fox said.
Fox developed a rash after Abby moved to her apartment. She discovered that she was allergic to the cat.
“When she first got the cat, she knew what I was up to,” Wienke said. “She knew that was a bunch of bull; it wasn’t Abby, it was her.”
Wienke kept visiting Fox after gave up the cat.
“It wound up I couldn’t keep the cat, but I kept him,” Fox said with a laugh.
Fox, 81, has been married twice before. She had been single for about 27 years when she met Wienke.
“My friends know me as ‘don’t want anybody, don’t need anybody, don’t put anybody in front of me,’ ” she said. “I pretty much made that clear to everybody.”
Wienke, 83, was married for 54 years to Betty Wienke, a former longtime Antelope Valley Community District trustee who died in October 2019 shortly after they moved into the village.
Neither Fox nor Wienke ever thought they would get married again until they met each other.
“I had no intention of ever getting involved with another woman my whole life,” Wienke said. “I took one look at her and I said, ‘Hey, something’s happening here.’ ”
Wienke was smitten. “As far as Wanda’s concerned, I just could not get her out of my mind,” he said. “It’s all I thought about for months and months and weeks and weeks.”
Fox was resistant at first, he added.
“I kind of told myself, ‘What have you got to lose?’ ” he said.
Their relationship evolved over the past year until they decided to get married.
“We are Christians and we don’t believe in living together,” Fox said.
They originally planned to get married in January but put it off when Wienke got sick. The couple took a trip to Palm Springs, where Wienke proposed over breakfast with a ring.
One of the servers at the facility adopted Abby. Abby became sick and was euthanized on April 6, the day Wienke and Fox married each other in the atrium of Rancho Village.
“We come from completely different backgrounds, but we seem to get along really well,” he said. “We have different interests and I accept the fact that she likes to be independent, which is no problem for me.”
Fox is sociable and has a group of lady friends she likes to spend time with. Wienke is more introverted, he said.
Fox has three adult children, two sons and a daughter. Her sons were happy their mother had a boyfriend. When she announced they were getting married, they were a little hesitant.
“What they didn’t understand is we’re not babies anymore,” she said. “We’re not waiting around another two or three years to get to know each other better. We knew each other just fine.”
Wienke has a son and two adult grandchildren.
“Wasn’t too happy to begin with,” he said of his family’s reaction to his marriage. “They come around.”
The couple both use walkers to get around. Fox also uses a cane.
“We got teased quite a bit here, but we knew what was right and what was wrong,” Fox said.
The day of the wedding, Fox said, “I was actually very excited for that evening to come.”
As it turned out, both were so tired from all of the activity they just crashed.
Fox gave up her apartment and moved into Wienke’s two-bedroom apartment.
“We had new flooring put in and new carpeting,” Wienke said.
They use one bedroom as a den. They had the cabinets repainted and the countertops replaced.
“If you took a picture of it when I lived in it and took a picture now, you wouldn’t even think it was the same place,” he said.
The furniture is the same furniture Fox had in her apartment.
Fox will keep her last name.
“At this age and stuff, I figured, ‘My gosh I don’t want to change my name,’” she said. “And I didn’t want to be Wanda Wienke, and he didn’t seem to mind.”
“Her first marriage she was a Wolf, now she’s a Fox, which she is,” Wienke said.
The couple are proof that you can find still find love no matter what age.
“I think it will be a harder journey for him than me because I’m so outgoing and kind of bossy and that kind of thing and he’s really just so patient and gentle,” Fox said. “God knew what he was doing, I’ll tell ya.”