GREENE – Anita Roy was a grandmother on a bus tour of the Canadian Rockies in 1997 when a fellow traveler offered her some candy.

That led to conversation, which led to friendship, then to a long-distance relationship between her and Peter van Oosten of Australia.

In 1998, they married in Auburn.

“The family story is, ‘Mom can’t be trusted away from the boys because she takes candy from strangers,'” joked Peter.

A native of Holland who spent most of his life in Australia, he took the bus trip by himself. Fourteen months earlier he had lost his first wife to cancer. A widow of two years, she took the tour with her cousin.

Throughout the 11 days of the trip, they often talked. “I did suggest he have lunch with us,” Anita said, whispering with a wink that he was slow in asking her out.

Near the end of the trip they spent an afternoon, alone for the first time, touring Victoria, British Columbia. That’s when they became an item, he said.

As the trip came to an end she was on one bus to Seattle. He was on another headed to Vancouver to catch a flight to Australia.

“It felt kind of sad,” he said.

“We did agree we would write,” she said. “That’s actually how we got to know one another. We did a tremendous amount of letter-writing, agreeing and opening up to each other.”

The relationship changed after she invited him to Auburn for a Christmas visit.

“He was here two days and he proposed,” she said.

“And she calls me slow,” he said, laughing. “In my mind it was almost a foregone conclusion.” Being with her again augmented his feelings for her and proposing seemed right.

Being with him “felt right from practically the very beginning for me,” she said.

Once they were engaged, he offered to move to Maine and leave behind his horse farm in Australia. The farm was his first wife’s passion, and he was ready to let it go. Besides, he had no children. She has five sons, nine grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren. It would have been unfair, Peter said, to drag her away from them.

Today, he’s retired from Habitat for Humanity, for which they have both volunteered. Both also are Eucharistic ministers and active in their church. Whether playing cards or having lunch with friends, they enjoy each other’s company.

He describes her as optimistic and open to people. She attracted his attention “because she had a sparkle. There’s a vivaciousness in her, in the eyes.” That hasn’t changed, he said.

She appreciates his intelligence, his love of talking. “I feel blessed that at age 73 I found a whole new world, a new love,” she said. “It was just meant to be. He just fit right into my life.”