“If you are meant to be with David Voelz, it will happen.”

High school crushes are never easy. And for Judi Gore, despite her friend’s attempt at prophetic wisdom, her high school crush was especially hard because David Voelz had eyes for someone else.

“I had a huge crush on him when I was a junior,” Judi explained. “I flirted and flirted until I could flirt no more… and he dated my best friend for a year and a half.”

And that, was that. Graduation from Los Alamos High School came and went for both David and Judi. He headed south to New Mexico State University and she in the opposite direction to Oregon. Neither kept in touch, nor really knew or thought about where the other was.

Judi didn’t stay in Oregon past her freshman year. It was too far from home and friends, and while she was trying to decide where to finish her degree, her mother convinced her to try NMSU.

The summer before she began her sophomore year, David Voelz walked into the McDonalds where she was working in Los Alamos, strolled up to her at the counter, got his Big Mac and fries and then walked away.

“I was in my ‘sexy’ brown McDonald’s uniform,” Judi teased. “I’m sure he couldn’t resist that!”

As it happens, David was too busy trying to iron out his next move to be concerned with Judi’s uniform. He wasn’t at that particular McDonald’s by chance.

While on summer breaks, David and a few friends would occasionally host an elaborate dinner party where they planned out a meal and cooked for the dates they invited. David needed a date, and a friend had told him Judi was back in town and working under the golden arches.

“So,” David said, “I got back in line to ask her out.”

At the time, Judi had no idea what was happening. “I asked him if he wanted ketchup,” she laughed.

Judi said “yes” to the date with David, and when she got off work that day, the first person she called was her mother. She remembers the call perfectly, “Mom! Guess who asked me out? He’s tall… and he’s cute… and he’s athletic… and he plays in the band!”

It would, however, be the only date they’d have that summer. And, while their time together left David with the knowledge that she’d be on campus in the fall, it was Judi’s efforts that brought them back together.

“This is the honest true story of how our Aggie love story began,” Judi said. “I was flunking the third semester of engineering calculus. I was a math major, and I was really in trouble.”

She went on to explain that a mutual friend suggested she contact David to help her because he was taking the same class.

So, Judi called him, and he told her to bring her book to his dorm room so he could help her.

“He lived in Garcia Hall, and I lived in the dorm they’ve torn down, WRC,” Judi said. “I went to his dorm room…and we never even opened that math book.”

Judi flunked the next test with a 37, while David ended up earning an A. And, while it was the end of Judi’s focus in math (she had to drop the class and change her major), it was the beginning of a new extracurricular focus: Judi and David, the couple.

“I tell my children,” Judi said, smiling. “I dropped the class. I dropped the major. But, I kept the tutor.”

It took another several years for the two to tie the knot. They both graduated from NMSU in 1981 and immediately headed to Illinois to pursue graduate degrees. It wasn’t until after some encouragement from David’s dad that he finally proposed. The couple married on August 12, 1983.

After 35 years and a series of life events, educational pursuits and careers (which are really stories for a different day), David and Judi are back where it all began. They are both happily integrated into the NMSU family – David as a professor of electrical engineering and Judi as the medical director for NMSU Health Services. They have three children, two of whom are beginning their own lives as Aggies and a third who is still a couple of years away from making his way along a crimson path.

“Thirty-five sounds like big number,” David said, looking at Judi.

Judi finished his thought, “But, when you meet somebody at 19 and you spend that much time together, it really isn’t. You’ve just grown up together.”

After all, Judi Gore was meant to be with David Voelz.

If you'd like to share your Aggie love story, please contact us at alumni@nmsu.edu.