Though they met in high school in the San Fernando Valley where they both were born and raised, it wasn’t until after they graduated when the sparks flew.
“I was doing a job for Kim’s dad,” states Tom. “I cruised by her house one evening with some friends to see her father and we locked eyes, and that’s all it took for me.”
For the next few months, Tom continued to call Kim’s father, but would end up speaking to Kim in the process. After an engagement party for a mutual friend, Tom put his arm around Kim and the rest…as they say…is history.
On February 14, 1984, Tom asked for Kim’s hand in marriage.
“He took me to French restaurant,” states Kim. “Tom had wanted to talk to my father alone before we went out, so I just knew this meant he was going to ask me to marry him.”
Tom got down on one knee and proposed, but I’m pretty certain he wasn’t expecting what was to follow.
“I figured that if he had all the time to plan how he was going to ask, I wanted to plan how I was going to say ‘yes’. So when he asked me, I said ‘maybe’.”
His jaw dropped.
“Can I answer you tomorrow?”
This didn’t go over quite the way Kim had humorously planned it.
He asked for the ring back, but she smiled and agreed to marry. The Bolewskis will be celebrating their 29th wedding anniversary on September 21. Together they have three sons, Christopher, Daniel and Alex.
In 2008, tragedy struck the Bolewski family. Tom was in a horrific motorcycle accident. “Our life came to a halt,” states Kim. “I was told that Tom was a brain damaged quadriplegic on a ventilator that would never recover and would be sent directly to a nursing home in West Covina to live out his life. In a millisecond, my mind raced through every emotion and everything I had ever learned in this life.” Kim decided to take Tom home.
Tom has been working with Taylor Isaacs, an Exercise Physiologist at The Center of Restorative Exercise in Northridge for the last four years and is now walking in the gym. His record is 27 steps.
“You think you know someone because you are married and live together but when you are challenged like this and you face mortality over and over, the synchronicity of the two lives working together for the best result is beyond description,” states Kim.
“From the very beginning I knew I had found my soul mate,” states Tom. “Everything about her was a compliment to what I wanted out of life. Our love and relationship was put through a test that I would want nobody else to have to go through. My injury, recovery, and life post accident has strengthened our bond and love for each other like I never could have imagined.”
“The number one rule in a marriage; nobody leaves when its not-so-good,” states Kim. “Everything had to be on the table and every challenged faced makes the communication better and the relationship stronger… Make time for each other and never, ever neglect the romance.” |
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