Weekends in Rome sealed the Doerings’ relationship

| January 23, 2025 | 0 Comments

BRUCE ORCHESTRATED a surprise 50th anniversary party for his wife, Lynn Doering.

A romantic rendezvous in Rome is where Bruce and Lynn Doering of Ridgewood Place started their 50-plus years together. They were both students at Stanford University in Palo Alto, where they met — she a sophomore from Las Vegas and he a junior from Montana. Bruce spotted her in their Italian class and, as he says, “She was knockdown gorgeous.”

THE DOERINGS at their wedding reception.

He asked her out to dinner. As Lynn puts it, “The date was contentious” because they had differing political views. This was the late 1960s and politics were a hot topic.

Nevertheless, the two continued with Italian class and spent two semesters abroad studying in Florence. Bruce said, “We only went to school four days a week, [so] Lynnie and I would hop on the train to Rome for the weekend.”

The Eternal City was where their conversations about philosophy, history and politics sealed their relationship. Bruce gets a little starry-eyed recounting these special times.

They both related an incident to the Larchmont Chronicle: “We went to a pensione in Rome. The guy behind the desk asked ‘One bed or two?’ Before either of us could answer he said, ‘You get one bed. Two beds are for old people.’”

Back at college for his senior year, Bruce moved off campus into a house with five other guys. Although Lynn had housing on campus, she basically lived with all the guys, further cementing her relationship with Bruce.

After graduating in 1970, Bruce moved to the Haight-Ashbury area of San Francisco with the same five guys. Lynn stayed at school.

The lovebirds hatched a plan to live together in San Francisco after Lynn graduated. However, Lynn came from a very conservative Greek Orthodox family. Living together was not an option.

Before Lynn’s mom came for graduation, Lynn’s more progressive Aunt Billie, who lived in San Francisco, had found a place for Lynn and Bruce to live — in sin! Aunt Billie furnished it to appear as though Lynn was the only occupant. Lynn’s mother came to town and was never the wiser.

In 1973, the two eloped and were married at San Francisco City Hall, which infuriated Lynn’s mother. It took quite a while and lots of coaxing from Bruce’s father before the bride’s family would throw a reception for the newlyweds.

Married and living in San Francisco

While in San Francisco, politically active Bruce unionized a discount store. This inspired Bruce to make further social changes. The Doerings then moved to Chicago.

Bruce became a union organizer at a steel factory on the south side of Chicago. He was instrumental in getting changes to the hazardous factory conditions and even snuck a Chicago Sun reporter onto the premises to reveal the horrific conditions.

Concurrently, Lynn was doing desk work at a South Chicago hospital. Being in this environment, Lynn found that helping people through nursing appealed to her. She got her nursing certification.

In 1977 their daughter Katie was born. The steel mills were closing down and laying people off in droves. Bruce’s grandfather was a prominent judge in Montana. Lynn suggested law school as an option for Bruce to pursue. In 1981 he was accepted to the UCLA School of Law. Off to California they went.

Life in Los Angeles

In Los Angeles, Lynn continued her nursing career, working at Cedars-Sinai, taking classes at Cal State Los Angeles and eventually being admitted to the School of Nursing at UCLA. She completed her master’s in nursing in 1986.

Upon graduation, she received multiple cash awards totaling $25,000 for her studies. Bruce proudly boasts, “She swept all of the awards, and that was the down payment for our home.”

Bruce had graduated from law school and was clerking at the law firm Taylor, Roth and Bush. In 1985 Jay Roth, a partner in the firm and resident of Norton Avenue, recommended Bruce for a job as the business representative at what is now the International Cinematographers Guild, Local 600. He got the job and stayed for 37 years. “It was just what I wanted,” Bruce said. Back to his passion of organizing unions and making work conditions better.

How did they get to the neighborhood?

This young family was ready to put down roots here in the City of Angels. After searching all over the city and not finding any homes that appealed to them, Aunt Billie came through again.

She recommended they reach out to a realtor friend of hers, Cookie Day. Ms. Day showed them their current house on Ridgewood Place, and they fell in love with it. “It was so much better than anything else we’d seen. We loved the area with all the local shops and the charm of the older homes,” the Doerings agree. Not to mention how walkable the area is.

With Lynn’s award money as their down payment, they moved in with their daughter in 1986 and have never looked back.

Lynn continued her education at UCLA and got her Ph.D in 1995. She worked her way up the ranks at the university and became associate dean of the School of Nursing. She retired in 2021.

Their daughter, Katie, is now married and has a daughter of her own, and her family also lives in the Los Angeles area.

And Bruce’s crew of friends that he lived with off campus in Palo Alto and San Francisco? They remain friends to this day, getting together annually for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and other gatherings throughout the year.

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Category: People

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