Tim and Deb Smith

We have a rather unique back story, most of which is set in upstate New York. We met on the first day of high school, brought together by the merger of two neighboring school districts. We ended up dating for all four years of high school, then went to different colleges and, as fate would have it, we ended up not seeing each other again for literally 40 years.
When Tim’s mom passed away, Deb heard about it through the grapevine in Virginia Beach where she was teaching. She sent him a sympathy card, he wrote back, one thing led to another and Tim ended up going down to Virginia Beach at the end of that school year to pick Deb up and bring her back home to New York.
The thing Deb remembers most from that courtship period when she was in Virginia, but longing to be back in New York, was that every day at school when she went to her mailbox, there was an envelope from Tim. And each one contained an original letter Deb had written to him 40 years ago. He had saved every one. His go-to line regarding that part of the story is to say, “Yeah, it took me a long time to play those cards!” Sometimes the best things in life are worth waiting for.
We got engaged on Deb’s mother’s birthday (December 4) and we got married on Tim’s mother’s birthday (June 12). Because we both have Native American ancestry, we had the ceremony performed at the Ganondagan Historic Site by the Native American leader there; also presiding over the ceremony was a former student of Tim’s.
So how did we get into this writing gig? Well, as fate would have it, we happen to live right next door to the newspaper office in our town. After hearing some of our stories, the publisher of the paper, Chris Carosa, suggested we write about our background and share it with the community. So we started by telling the personal story of our relationship, and we haven’t stopped writing since. Currently our weekly feature comprises the entire back page of the Mendon-Honeoye Falls-Lima Sentinel, we have a second column that always runs on page 2, and we frequently contribute additional pieces. Contributing to the community is a passion of ours.
We write about an eclectic variety of topics including entertainment, sports, travel, history and human interest. Chris Carosa, who we mentioned above, had been encouraging us to write a book since we first began writing for the paper. That first book came to fruition with the publication of The Beatles, the Bible & Manson: Reflecting Back with 50 Years of Perspective during the summer of 2019. We hope you’ve enjoyed Royally Regaling Greater Rochester so much you’ll be interested in checking out the rest of our work. Listed below is our entire catalog of published books…

2019 ~ The Beatles, the Bible & Manson: Reflecting Back with 50 Years
of Perspective
2020 ~ Tit for Tat Exchanges ~ Tim & Deb’s Greatest Hits
2021 ~ What’s in a Name? ~ Your Geography Hall of Fame
2022 ~ Blacks Facts ~ An Ultimate Primer to the Historical and the
Hysterical
2023 ~ Walking in a Women’s Wonderland ~ An Ultimate Primer to the
Historical and the Hysterical
2024 ~ Crowning the Animal Kingdom
2025 ~ Royally Regaling Greater Rochester ~ Taking Stock of the ROC