THE FIRST FEMALE GOVERNOR of New York was sitting in the back of the Apollo Family Restaurant in Buffalo one recent Wednesday afternoon when an older man in a VFW baseball hat approached. The governor, wearing a light-brown suit and a gold nameplate necklace that read vaxed, looked up from her rice pudding.
“I hate to interrupt, but I need to ask a burning question. Did you ever go out with a guy named Jim Wilson?”
Kathleen Courtney Hochul, age 63, married for 37 years, thought for a beat. Then she asked, “Jim Wilson who played football with my brother?”
“Yeah.”
“I did not go out with him.”
“Aww, that lying son of a—”
“Is he saying I went out with him?
“Yeah, he said he dated you.”
“Nah, tell him, ‘In his dreams.’”
She laughed. The man laughed. The governor considered the possibility again.
“I didn’t date that many guys,” she said after a moment of reflection. “I’d remember. I was kind of a nerd.”
This story is from the November 22 - December 5, 2021 edition of New York magazine.
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This story is from the November 22 - December 5, 2021 edition of New York magazine.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
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