Former Sen. Harris Wofford shares he's marrying a man 20 years after his wife's death

(Image credit: Twitter.com/TheAdvocate)

published 25 April 2016

In a poignant piece for The New York Times, former U.S. Sen. Harris Wofford (D-Pa.) announced that 20 years after his wife's death, he is getting remarried, this time to a man he felt an "immediate spark" with 15 years ago.

Wofford writes that his wife of 48 years, Clare, died of leukemia in 1996 at the age of 70. He was "sure I would never again feel the kind of love Clare and I shared," and assumed he was too old to find someone else. During a trip to Ft. Lauderdale five years later, he met Matthew Charlton, then 25, and he was struck by his "inquisitive and thoughtful manner and his charm." The pair were decades apart in age, "yet we clicked," Wofford wrote, and a friendship was formed. Wofford and Charlton enjoyed traveling together, and as time went on, "we realized that our bond had grown into love," Wofford wrote. "Other than with Clare, I had never felt love blossom this way before."

It took him three years to tell his sons and daughter about his new relationship, and his children have welcomed Charlton into the family (Charlton's parents have also embraced Wofford). Their bond "is entirely natural" to some, while others view it as a "strange surprise," and now, 15 years after meeting, Wofford, 90, and Charlton, 40, are getting married on April 30. "Too often our society seeks to label people by pinning them on the wall — straight, gay, or in between," Wofford writes. "I don't categorize myself based on the gender of those I love. I had a half-century of marriage with a wonderful woman, and now am lucky for a second time to have found happiness." Read Wofford's entire essay at The New York Times.

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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.