"You know, I've been telling people for quite a few years that if God has this man for me, he [the man, not God] would have to come knocking at my door. Because that's the only way" Tonya Puckett said she'd ever find her way to another marriage.
Well, the Rev. Melvin Miller of Progressive Baptist Church in St. Paul came a-knocking.
The former wife of Twins Hall of Famer Kirby Puckett — he died at age 45 in 2006 — and Miller were married Saturday at his church. The marriage was officiated by Melvin's father, the Rev. Earl Miller, senior pastor at the church.
"A funny thing happened," she told me Wednesday. "I was looking for a tutor for my son, [Kirby Jr.] and my kids' godmother said to me: 'I know this guy; I'm going to run to the church right now.' I didn't know who he was, and I think it was that evening he came knocking at my door. I met him because he was working with my son. And I loved how he [Miller] interacted with him [Kirby Jr.]. I loved how he told him he could be and do anything he wanted. And I loved the way he would pray with him. That was the first thing. We developed a friendship."
They met in March or April 2012, Puckett said, "and we've been engaged I guess several months and started planning a wedding in about three or four months. It went pretty quick." He has four children, she has two. "Overnight, we have quite a few kids," she laughed.
While congratulating Puckett, I told her she was a brave woman to try marriage again, given that she is financially secure.
"I was talking to a woman the other day and she said the same thing to me: 'I will never get married.' and I said, 'I was that same person.' Kirby and I haven't been married for 11 years, but I have no reason to get married. I don't need to get married. I don't want to get married.
"But this is the kind of guy he would have to be, and if God sent that man to me, then there would have to be no denying. Really, for the last five years I've not even gone on a date.