I Had This Funny Feeling

Susie and David Young

Susie Davis and David Young were students at the University of Florida when they bonded over Highlands. Six years later, they were married and living in Highlands. And here is how the fairy tale happened.

Susie first caught David’s eye at Bennigan’s restaurant in Gainesville where he spotted her in March 1983. He told his friend Cal at the time, “I am going to marry that girl.”

In retrospect, it was an odd thing for David to say. Not only was David in a serious romantic relationship, but Cal had earlier mentioned his own interest in Susie.

In any case, Susie and David chatted briefly. He told her he was just finishing his first year in the master’s program in building construction and learned that she was about to graduate and planning to enroll in the MBA program in the fall. When she asked him where he was from and he told her he was from Highlands, she joked, “No one’s from Highlands.”

Although David lived mostly in West Palm Beach at the time, he explained, “Actually I am, I was born at the Highlands Hospital.” Susie, who had grown up in Scituate, Mass., had moved to Jacksonville the summer before 6th grade and spent childhood summers at riding camp at High Hampton in Cashiers.

Years later Susie recalled their initial meeting, “We had a fun conversation, and I thought he was very, very handsome, but also a little arrogant. I think he thought I was interested in his roommate.”

David reflected that “I had this funny feeling about her from the start. She was really pretty. I was charmed by her look and manner; her laughter, how happy she was with her friends. I didn’t know if she liked me, but I liked her.”

1988

It wasn’t until he had broken off his previous relationship, it was May, that David telephoned. When he did, Susie was in the shower and by then her recollection of him was hazy. She didn’t take the call. But her roommate who had answered the phone, was from West Palm Beach, knew David and urged Susie to return the call.

Their first date was at Snuffy’s Restaurant – a college hangout with great food. “I remember eating my burger and looking over and realizing he wasn’t eating – he was talking a lot. I asked him if I could have his,” Susie said. David was smitten immediately, he recognized in her a warmth and wit that he found refreshing.

They began dating. “David was cute, very sweet, kind, and helpful. He would come over and fix everything in the apartment.” A couple of months later they visited David’s family in Highlands, and Susie realized she was in love. Although David admits to knowing all along that they would eventually marry, he wasn’t ready to commit.

David completed his master’s program in 1984 and moved back to Palm Beach, working for a developer as a project manager. Susie stayed on in Gainesville to complete her master’s program, getting a job in Ft. Lauderdale with NCNB after graduation.

Though they continued to see each other, they were both very involved with their careers.

It was 1986 before things got serious.

In 1987 David proposed. They had been together for four years by that point. David remembers that even his mother asked, “What are you waiting for?” “We were devoted to each other, but I didn’t want to get married too young. Susie hung in there, I knew she had job offers everywhere but she waited for me. Her friends always thought I should have asked sooner.”

They pledged their troth in April 1988 at the St. Edwards Catholic Church in Palm Beach. A reception for 200 guests followed at the Sailfish Club, and after a honeymoon to Napa Valley, they settled down to domesticity in West Palm Beach.

That summer, on a visit to Highlands, at a meeting of the Young family, it was decided that the newlyweds would move to Highlands to work in the family business. Which they did in 1989 so that David could supervise the family’s commercial and residential properties, and Susie manage Wits End, the Main Street store started by David’s grandmother 83 years ago.

1985

Their oldest daughter, Rebecca was born in 1990; their son Tyler in 1992, and the twins – Kevin and Caroline in 1997. Susie recounts the early days of their marriage, the years raising the children, as some of the most romantic and best of times. Though she’s quick to add that, “All the different phases of our lives have been wonderful in different ways.”

Thirty-five years later, their love still thrives. They each happily tell me how they have stayed together.

David speaks to Susie’s “outgoing love of people, her interpersonal warmth, and the kindnesses she shows everyone.” He admires her skill at running Wits End and the masterful job she did raising their four children.”

Susie talks about David’s “sincerity, his warmth, his passion for everything he does, his work ethic, and his dedication to me, his family, and the family legacy.”

And finally, “His smile can still make me melt when he walks into a room – just as it did 40 years ago.”