Although their paths ran parallel at times, it was a speed-dating event on Zoom that brought Theodora Rust Clark and Alexis Brooke Redding together in November 2022.
“I did what I assume most people do when you log into Zoom speed dating: Survey the little strip of people at the top,” Ms. Clark said of the event, which was coordinated by the matchmaking service Little Gay Book. “I noticed Alexis immediately because she was very beautiful, and she was in the Boston area.”
Ms. Clark, 45, who goes by Dorie, lives in Miami, but she has spent many years in Massachusetts. She received a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Smith College at the age of 18, and a master’s degree in theological studies from the Harvard Divinity School. She is a speaker, consultant and author of several business books, including “The Long Game: How to Be a Long-Term Thinker in a Short-Term World” and “Stand Out: How to Find Your Breakthrough Idea and Build a Following Around It.”
Ms. Redding, 49, has a bachelor’s degree in fine arts, a master’s degree in human development and psychology, and a doctoral degree in human development and education, all from Harvard. She is a developmental psychologist who teaches education at Harvard and lives in Cambridge, Mass.
Ms. Redding also noticed Ms. Clark right away. “Dorie has this captivating energy,” she said. “There were 30 people on the Zoom screen, and she immediately stood out as so dynamic.”
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When they were paired for a brief online date, they fell into an easy rapport. “It was so disappointing when our five minutes were over,” Ms. Redding said.
The next day, Little Gay Book distributed the contact information of pairs who had indicated interest in each other. Ms. Clark reached out immediately when she received Ms. Redding’s email address, and they had a phone call that lasted around two hours.
It was only the beginning of their marathon chats. Over weekly and then daily calls that sometimes stretched to three hours, they discovered how much they had in common, including a vegetarian lifestyle and an interest in helping people navigate their careers.
They also realized that they had lived near each other twice over two decades. They had even taken the same route to Harvard Square, near the center of Cambridge, as undergraduates. “Except I walked the back way along buildings, and she walked the front way,” Ms. Clark said. “We were probably paces from each other multiple times but never met.”
Before Ms. Clark flew to Boston for their first in-person date in January 2023, Ms. Redding made a startling prediction. “I said, ‘You realize you’re going to marry me?’” she recalled saying to Ms. Clark. “At some point, it stopped making sense that this wasn’t my person.”
Ms. Clark was more hesitant. “It was an enormously promising situation, and I liked her so much, but it was important to see if the rapport translated in person,” she said. When they met in Ms. Clark’s hotel lobby, “I turned the corner to see her for the first time, and we just fell into each other’s arms,” Ms. Redding said.
For their first in-person date, they grabbed dinner from the vegetarian cafe Life Alive, which became a fixture in their long-distance relationship. “When she visits me in Miami, she will order Life Alive and triple bag it in Ziploc bags and carry it through security to bring my favorite grain bowl from there,” Ms. Clark said.
Given Ms. Clark’s rigorous travel schedule for speaking events, “we have a running spreadsheet to show where each of us is at any given moment,” Ms. Redding said. “But we knew at the outset that we would do whatever we needed to spend time together.”
Just over a year after their first Cambridge date, Ms. Clark proposed in the vegan restaurant Eleven Madison Park in Manhattan.
They were wed Nov. 1 at the Harvard Faculty Club with just their mothers present. The ceremony was officiated by Dr. Vivek H. Murthy, the U.S. surgeon general and a college classmate of Ms. Redding’s at Harvard. Dr. Murthy received a one-day marriage designation from the secretary of the commonwealth of Massachusetts to officiate. After the ceremony, the brides and their mothers went to afternoon tea at the Boston Public Library.
For now, they plan to split their time between Miami and Cambridge. “The short version is that they’re probably not going to move Harvard anytime soon, so we’re working it out,” Ms. Clark said.
The two have written articles together for publications like Fast Company, and their work lives are set to further overlap. In March 2025, they will both participate in L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.+ Leadership in Higher Education, a program at Harvard. “Even when we’re not collaborating, she shows up for all my keynotes,” Ms. Redding said. “She’s always in the front row.”
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