I spent many decades living in New York city, single and teaching Pilates. A Rye girl, I grew up on Cayuga Street in Indian Village, graduated from Rye High School in 1979, and was the daughter of John Jay DuBois, a physician at Rye Medical Group and direct descendent of John Jay. My mom, Adrienne A. DuBois; my sister, Catherine, and brother, Peter, attended Christ’s Church, Manursing Island Club, and the Apawamis Club. I will always have Rye in my heart and soul.
At the age of 56, though, I moved from New York to Vancouver, Wash., because living on 57th Street between Fifth and Sixth avenues had become wildly expensive. Life in Vancouver was a major adjustment, and I felt gloomy because of my extremely different lifestyle and all that rain.
One morning I woke up, and out of the blue decided to join a group on an 11-mile hike. I had never hiked before, so I wore sneakers and didn’t bring a backpack. Anyway, I made it, step by step.
Then the miracle happened. The group leader, an expert hiker named John, asked me if I would join him on another hike he had planned with his best buddy, a guy who had lost his wife to cancer years before. So, we set up a time to hike.
I met David Shaen Rouse on that next hike. His father had immigrated from Ireland and raised cattle on a ranch in Baker, Ore. David’s childhood could not have been more different from mine.
We fell madly in love that day. We dated and he proposed to me in a green lagoon while skinny dipping in Tahiti. We were married five years ago on a beach by a sandy river. The hiking leader officiated. We moved to Bend, Ore., an outdoor recreation paradise. The foundation for our love is health and nature.
We are the most compatible couple imaginable and have not had a cross word in five years. Today, I am 63, and believe love can be found at any age. You just never know. One day you just might shoot the moon and find the cowboy of your dreams.
— Anne DuBois (married to David Shaen Rouse)
