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Pat and Paulette Martin have the type of love that people spend lifetimes searching for. The charismatic duo originally met in August of 2015 when Pat was planning a women’s dance. SAGE offered to support the dance committee by providing a space where the group could meet and plan their special evening. Paulette was a member of that committee.

During one of the planning meetings, Paulette told the group they should “be in submission” to Pat. While Paulette did find Pat’s eyes and smile beautiful, she was not intentionally flirting. She meant that the group should listen and pay Pat respect, because she knew what she was doing. For Pat, the comment piqued her interest.

After the event had passed, Paulette innocently deleted old numbers from her phone, including Pat’s. Little did she know, she would run into her again just weeks later at church.

On that fateful Sunday, Pat came in and recognized Paulette immediately. Naturally, she turned on her charm, slipped next to her, and placed her arm around the back of the pew. The two sat next to each other the entire service, and Paulette remembers a tingling in her body that was hard to ignore.

Afterward, Pat asked if she still had her number. Of course, Paulette did not. So, Pat gave Paulette her number and told her not to delete it again.

Shortly after, Paulette got all dressed up, “looking fierce,” and wanted to spend a night on the town with someone worthy of her time. Who did she call? Pat.

But in their natural playful fashion, Pat did not make it easy for her. Paulette had to convince her to go out with her after deleting her number prior.

“I told her ‘When a lady asks you out, you shouldn’t say no,’” Paulette recalled.

Paulette convinced Pat to go, and the two ended up at the famous queer women’s bar Henrietta Hudson, dancing the night away. That would be their first date and a night that they would look back on fondly — October 10, 2015.

A few years later, on April 10, 2018, Pat and Paulette got married. It was, and is, a big deal to the two of them to be able to do so. They were finally able to have the same rights in the eyes of the law as other couples.

Today, Paulette teaches jewelry and self-care/wellness classes at the SAGE Center in Harlem. Pat attends SAGE events and runs her own group: the Masculine Identified Lesbians of Color Collective. Recently, they took part in an NYC subway ad campaign for SAGE’s new Center for Sexual Wellness & Aging that ran in October of 2024 – nearly a decade after their first date.

We at SAGE thank Pat and Paulette for sharing their love story with us and wish them many more happy years of dancing, flirting, and making memories!