LIFESTYLES
Protections lifted
for Yellowstone
grizzlies/6C
WEEKEND, AUGUST 5-6, 2017
Heat spurs
classic sidewalk
experiment/5C
Taking
the plunge
Staff photo by Kathy Aney
Ron Haynes and Sally Ann Peters pose Wednesday with their water aerobics class at the Roundup Athletic Club. The two met at the class when
Haynes started attending after suffering a stroke. Their wedding plans were interrupted a year ago when Peters had a stroke, too.
Swim buddies fi nd love at Pendleton pool
Story and photo by KATHY ANEY
S
troke survivors Ron Haynes
and Sally Ann Peters are
helping each other stay afl oat
in troubled waters.
Haynes and Peters met at
the swimming pool. On Friday
afternoon, they exchanged vows
as their water aerobics classmates
looked on.
Haynes started going to
the aqua class at the Roundup
Athletic Club pool as a way to
recuperate from a devastating
stroke. The stroke hit seven years
ago as the retired teacher slept on
a cot in his wife Judy’s Oregon
Health & Science University
hospital room in Portland. Judy,
recovering from cancer surgery,
called a nurse when Ron fell ill.
“The nurse got me into a
wheelchair and wheeled me to the
emergency department,” recalled
Haynes, 65. “They determined I
was having a stroke.”
So began Haynes’ long journey
back to health. The Pilot Rock
man started going to the Pend-
leton pool as a low-impact way to
get his body moving again. One
day, Peters noticed Haynes was in
a spot of trouble.
“He slipped under the water,”
Peters said. “I helped him up.”
They became aqua buddies.
Peters stayed close in case he
foundered.
“She kept an eye on me,”
Haynes said, as did the other class
members and instructor Julie
Sneden-Carlson.
“We are truly a community in
here,” Sneden-Carlson said of
her class. “We share each other’s
joys and sorrows.”
The class fl uctuates between
25 and 35. It’s an easygoing
group. Sneden-Carlson keeps
them moving during each session,
but before and after and even
during, her charges share each
other’s lives. The class grieved
“We are truly a
community in here.
We share each
other’s joys and
sorrows.”
— Julie Sneden-Carlson,
swim class instructor
with Haynes, for example, when
his wife died of congestive heart
failure last April.
Peters and Haynes’ friendship
deepened further as time went on,
bonded in part by life experiences
they share in common. Both had
divorced in their younger years,
then married again. Each lost a
second spouse to death. Haynes,
who grew up in California, the
son of a school administrator,
taught history and business at
Aloha High School near Port-
land. Peters, raised in Pomeroy,
Washington, grew up on a wheat
farm, attended secretarial school
and fi nished out her career as
the head of the human resources
♦
East Oregonian
department at the Lourdes Health
Network in Pasco. Haynes has a
son and Peters has two daughters.
Last summer, the swimmers
say love blossomed in earnest.
“Things went really fast,”
Haynes said of their romance.
“From July 3 on, we were an
item.”
The rest of the class detected
smiles and whispers between the
two. One day last summer, Sned-
en-Carlson noticed the couple
was holding hands underwater.
“We watched love bloom,” said
Helen Gowan, who attends the
water aerobics classes three times
a week. “It was heartwarming to
see.”
When Haynes eventually
asked Peters to marry him, she
said yes. The couple planned to tie
the knot at the Episcopal Church
of the Redeemer in Pendleton in
November of 2016. Then, a month
before the nuptials, on October
11, the unexpected happened —
Peters suffered a stroke, too.
She was loaded aboard an
airplane bound for Providence
St. Vincent Medical Center in
Portland. At the St. Vincent emer-
gency room, Peters had a second
stroke. Eventually, she ended up
in College Place at Regency at
the Park care center where she
struggled to regain her health.
Wedding plans went on hold.
Aqua class friends responded
with cards, visits to Peters and
rides to class for Haynes. When
Peters transferred to Elizabethan
Manor in Pendleton, Haynes
decided he would move there,
too, to be with her. The decision
meant he needed to give away
his beloved springer spaniel, P.J.
The dog found a home with water
aerobics friend Grace Nelson.
“It was a total act of love,”
Nelson said of Haynes’ decision
to give away his dog. “It was
devastating for Ron.”
On Friday, P.J. was in atten-
dance when Haynes and Peters
exchanged vows in Elizabethan
Manor’s dining room.
The
ceremony, called a ceremony
of commitment, stops just short
of a traditional wedding. While
the ceremony contains all the
religious elements, there is no
legal involvement by the state.
The ceremony offered a way to be
blessed by the church, but doesn’t
affect the couple fi nancially as
they work to pay their medical
bills.
The couple will honeymoon at
Wildhorse Resort, a gift from the
water aerobics class. Afterwards,
the pair will settle into a life
focused on each other and the
long slog of recovering from their
respective strokes. Sally Ann has
one goal she hopes to accomplish
before long.
“I want to get back in the pool,”
she said.
As the couple heads into the
next leg of their journey together,
they know one thing — the water
aerobics class will have their
backs.
———
Contact Kathy Aney at
kaney@eastoregonian.com
or
call 541-966-0810.