[Nfbf-l] Couple Weds after Guide Dogs Become an Item

[Alan Dicey]

Dear Friends,
I saw this story on CNN the other morning!
Couple Weds after Guide Dogs Become an Item
Claire Johnson and Mark Gaffey from Hanford, Stoke-On-Trent, only lived a
mile-and-a-half away from each other but had never met.
(Photo: Agencies).
A besotted blind couple told today how they found love and got engaged - 
when their guide dogs became an item.
Claire Johnson, 50, first fell for Mark Gaffey, 52, when her Labrador dog 
Venice got friendly with fellow guide dog Rodd at Guide Dog Training classes 
in Shrewsbury, Shropshire.
The two dogs - both aged three - became inseparable and soon their owners, 
who are both registered blind, soon realized they were head over heels for 
each other too.

After an 11 month whirlwind romance, the couple, from Stoke-on-Trent, 
Staffs. got engaged and will tie the knot next March - with their dogs 
acting as ring-bearers.

Mark, who was blind from birth, first met Claire when she took her dog 
Venice to a two week Guide Dog Training course last March.

He said: 'During the training our two dogs, Rodd and Venice, seemed to know 
something we didn't.
"They were always playing together and nuzzling up together. "The trainers 
said that they were the love and romance of the course, and they brought us 
together. We could have easily missed one another by a week because it was a 
residential course and we just happened to be put on the same one."

"It's ironic we met there because we discovered that we only lived a 
mile-and-a-half away from each other but had never met."

"We were purely in the right place at the right time."
"I have never believed in fate, but it does seem like it was meant to be.

"Each time me and Claire met for lunch the time we spent chatting got longer 
and the waitresses were tapping their fingers waiting for us to leave."
"There was a connection from the word go. We chatted about anything and 
everything.

'I trusted in the luck I didn't seem to know existed.
"Now we joke that with every guide dog you get a free fiance. I love 
Claire's personality and her laugh is infectious.
"We've never had an argument, we just seem to click."


The couple's love-story was featured in the ITV show "Me and My Guide Dog" 
broadcast last night.

Claire, who lost her sight due to diabetes when she was 24, yesterday told 
how she made the first move when she invited Mark for coffee at the end of 
the two-week residential course.
She said: "We connected straight away. I remember Mark texting me saying "If 
you'd let me I could make your world a lot happier".
"It was a lovely surprise when he proposed the first time on Valentines' 
Day, but I got proposed to four times that day because he kept going down on 
one knee."
"I suppose I can never say I will forget the day I got engaged."
"And it wouldn't have happened if it wasn't for our dogs.

"Rodd and Venice sleep in the same bed and are as much a couple as me and 
Mark."
"They will be walking us down the aisle and be ring bearers. This wedding is 
down to them."

Claire and Mark will get married at Barlaston's Upper House hotel in March 
next year.
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