ABOVE: Tom Gaige and Dewey Turner, photo by Lightheart Photography.
Tom Gaige wasn’t expecting to find love when he and his friends traveled to Gainesville for a weekend trip. But they invited along another friend of theirs, Dewey Turner, whom Gaige had never met. Though they were connected on Facebook, it was surprising they had never met in person before.
“I heard my friends talk about him all the time, though. Dewey this, Dewey that,” he says.
Sparks didn’t fly during their first face-to-face encounter, rather it was the start of a slow burn.
Just before their weekend out of town, Gaige tripped and fell, breaking his wrist. “I was pretty banged up, but I was determined to go on this trip,” the New Port Richey resident says.
His doctor called in pain medications to a CVS in Gainesville. “But nobody would bring me there,” he recalls. “Then Dewey stepped up and volunteered to take me.”
This was the first time he was struck by how sweet Turner was.
Over the weekend, they got to know one another better and Gaige learned that Turner lived in North Redington Beach. Turner’s family had been vacationing to the beach town for decades and was excited to meet someone else who knew the area.
“My family has had a timeshare there for more than 25 years,” he says. “He lived literally across the street from the apartment where my family had been vacationing. What are the odds of that? We knew all the same places.”
He was also enamored with Turner’s “odd sense of humor,” or rather, how gullible he could be. Their mutual friend Bill jokingly invited him to Gaige’s house for a pajama party and Turner showed up in his PJs.
“Still can’t believe he fell for that one,” Gaige muses. “Grown men in pajamas?”
Then, he landed in the hospital with pneumonia and though they had only met a few times, Turner drove more than an hour to visit him.
“We didn’t know each other that well yet, but I wanted to see him,” Turner explains. Because of the long drive, their friend Bill, again, jokingly, suggested he stay at Gaige’s house since no one was there anyway. Turner did just that and later came back to pick up Gaige from the hospital.
“The real big start” of their relationship came as Hurricane Irma was bearing down on Florida in September 2017, Gaige says. Turner knew was being evacuated from his beachside home and asked if he could stay at Gaige’s house.
“He arrived four days before the hurricane,” Gaige recalls. “He stayed for two weeks and basically never went home. We were together that whole time through the storm.”
Turner relished the opportunity to spend time with him. “It was a great opportunity to get to know each other. We had some long conversations that were very nice,” Turner says.
Gaige adds, “It’s a little different when you’re older and not 20.”
When Turner’s lease was up, he moved into the New Port Richey home. “It made sense. Why stay there when you’re up here all the time,” Gaige says.
Over the next year, they decided together that they would get married. Gaige had been married once before. His husband died of heart failure eight years ago at the age of 46.
“I never dreamed I would get a second chance at love,” he says. “I’m so lucky. Dewey is amazing.”
He took rings he had owned with his first husband that were “made with love” and had a jeweler remake them into something new for him and Turner to wear.
Though their engagement was a mutual decision, Turner decided “one of us had to propose.” He got down on one knee on New Year’s Day in 2019, and where else would they get married other than North Redington Beach?
They held their ceremony on the beach and their reception at the DoubleTree Beach Resort there. “Directly across from where Dewey used to live,” he says.
The ceremony was held an hour before sunset and the beach “was really a beautiful backdrop,” Turner says. Gaige adds that their rainbow-themed wedding was the perfect way to celebrate their love with friends and family.
“It was an amazing day,” he says. “We wanted it to be fun and be a little campy, which is why we went with the whole rainbow theme, and that’s just what it was. We’re very fortunate we got to have the wedding that a lot of people wish they had.”
Engagement Date: Jan. 1, 2019
Wedding Date: March 1, 2020
Wedding Ceremony Venue: North Redington Beach
Wedding Reception Venue: DoubleTree Beach Resort
Wedding Song and First Dance: Rachel Patton’s “A Better Place”
Wedding Theme/Colors: Rainbow
Wedding Planner: Florida Paradise
Weddings Caterer: DoubleTree Beach Resort
Bakery: The Cake Girl
Cake: 3-tier Rainbow
Photographer: Lightheart Photography
