Pat Albers and William “Joe” Rainey may have been married for only 14 months, but it was a wonderful marriage.
So says Albers, 72, who married Rainey in September 2019. Rainey, 78, died of cancer Nov. 12 at the couple’s home in Laguna Woods Village.
Rainey faced his squamous cell carcinoma diagnosis and treatment with bravery and great dignity, Albers said Sunday, Nov. 22.
“The cancer is believed to have been caused by Agent Orange exposure while serving during the Vietnam War,” she said.
The couple married after he proposed while they were on a 19-day Panama Canal cruise.
“It was such a great day, he got down on his knee and asked me to be his wife,” Albers recalled. “We loved to travel, and we had planned on more cruises next year, but because of the pandemic and his passing, I had to cancel them.”
Albers said Rainey, who is her second husband, was loved and adored by many as a proud American, a great storyteller and an avid golfer at Laguna Woods Golf Club. Rainey also served in the U.S. Marine Corps and worked in the airline and insurance industries.
A community man, Rainey — who went by his middle name, Joe — was appointed to the Laguna Woods City Council in 2017; he resigned only recently after his health declined. He also served as commander of American Legion Post 257 and on the Village Management Services Board of Directors.
Laguna Woods Mayor Noel Hatch met Rainey four years ago, as one of many candidates applying for an appointment to the City Council.
“Joe presented himself at the selection meeting with the same characteristics he regularly thereafter displayed on the council when he was selected by its members to serve with them — namely, a calm, steady, optimistic, outgoing sort of guy,” Hatch said by email Sunday.
He said Rainey regularly addressed matters before the council with a “can-do” attitude, always seeking to better the fortunes of the city and its residents.
“I imagine his military training had much to do with this approach,” the mayor said. “And then his auditing experience helped oversee the city’s enviable position among California’s 453 cities studied by the California State Auditor office, ranking us as having the 11th lowest risk of experiencing future fiscal distress. And as such, Laguna Woods is rated as having the lowest financial risk in all of Orange County and the greater Los Angeles area’s cities.”
Rainey’s “warm and engaging strength will be missed,” Hatch said.
“His departure from the city and this life happened so quickly that it has been for all of us who worked with him a stunning loss.”
Albers met Rainey in 2018 at a Saddleback Church grief support meeting in Clubhouse 5. She was part of the support group’s leadership team, and he went to the meeting because he had difficulty coping with the death of his first wife, Rene.
Rainey and Rene had been married 28 years and lived in the Village for 21 years. She died of cancer in 2017, Albers said.
Albers had lost her first husband, a member of the U.S. Coast Guard, in 2016 due to cancer.
“Joe and Rene played golf a lot, and this was one of the reasons they moved from Fountain Valley to the Village because of all the golf courses we have,” Albers said.
Rainey started going to the grief support meetings more often, and one day he called Albers to say he was very depressed and invited her to lunch. She called the leadership team and asked if it was OK for her to go with him, since it was “against policy to date someone in the group as this was not a dating club.” The leaders gave her the thumbs up, and she and Rainey met, talked, and then met many more times to discuss their loss and how to heal.
At the time, Rainey was attending Crossline Church, but he eventually switched to Saddleback Church to be with Albers and to sit in on the Bible study group.
“Everyone liked him,” Albers recalled. “He was a talker and a doer, and we became good friends.”
They grew closer when Albers suffered a stroke in 2018 and was hospitalized for 17 days. Rainey met Albers’ daughter, Stephanie, at the hospital and discussed the possibility of Albers moving into his two-bedroom home to take care of her and help her recuperate.
“He told my daughter I could have one room and it had a lock on the door,” Albers said, laughing. “I moved in and he drove me around, took care of me and did anything I needed.”
About eight months later, after Albers recovered, she and Rainey went on that Panama Canal cruise and he proposed.
“He was always good to me, my daughter, and my five grandkids,” she said. “In the community, he was always into doing things and involved in City Council. He liked helping people, and nobody was surprised he took it on himself to take care of me.”
Before they tied the knot, Rainey had a few minor surgeries, including one to remove cancer in his left ear.
“The doctors took many CT scans and didn’t feel the cancer had moved to his arm or brain or heart, so we went on the cruise,” Albers said.
However, shortly after the cruise, doctors discovered a lump on the back of his head and removed it.
“They said he didn’t have cancer (anymore), but eight months after me taking care of him, on Oct. 6, he collapsed out of the bed,” Albers said.
Rainey was taken to Kaiser Permanente in Irvine and stayed for tests. Albers was instructed to go home because of pandemic restrictions. The doctor called her at 1 a.m.: The CT scan had revealed bad news.
The cancer “went really quick to his brain, and they recommended Joe be put into hospice,” Albers said.
Hospice nurses arrived the next day and set everything up in the living room. Rainey died Nov. 12.
“I was with him all the time, every step of the way,” Albers said.
Through it all, she credits the help of her church and its volunteers who have been “praying for her, calling daily, bringing great food, and getting through it with family, her daughter, grandkids.”
Mike Baker, Rainey’s “adopted son,” was close to Rainey and Rene for many years.
“Joe was a very close friend and, in a few ways, a mentor to me in golf and life. Because Joe didn’t have a son, I kind of became his son over the years,” said Baker, 55, who lives in Costa Mesa, does bookkeeping and owns a web marketing business.
Baker met Rainey in 2007 at a Bible study meeting at Lake Hills Christian Church, now Crossline Church. During the Bible study, the leader suggested the younger men in the group find a mentor, someone to help them grow in their faith.
“Joe and I connected right away, and when Joe invited me to dinner, I got to meet Rene, and they quickly became like family,” Baker said.
Along with learning from Rainey and playing golf with him, Baker said he also came to help military veterans.
“Joe was the one who taught me to always thank a veteran or active-duty individual for their service,” Baker recalled. “But honestly, some of the best times we had were just sitting at his place watching football or golf and just talking about life.”
Baker also enjoyed going to the 19 Restaurant after a round of golf and sharing a beer with his friend.
“I will miss him telling me everything will be OK when I was worried, and listening to his many stories. Most of all, I will just miss spending time with my friend.”
Baker saw Rainey about an hour or two before he died.
“I got to tell him I loved him even though he couldn’t respond,” he said. “The last time I spoke with him was a few days before he passed. I believe in always telling the people you care about that you love them because you never know when the last time will be. I got to pray with him, read some scripture and play his favorite song for him — ‘Amazing Grace,’” he said.
Rainey had the “biggest heart of anyone you will meet and didn’t care who you were or where you have been, he loved you just as you were.”
“He also loved to tell stories; he was the life of anywhere he went,” Baker recalled. “And he had some great stories to tell. Joe did his best to demonstrate the love of Jesus in his actions more than just his words. He will be missed by many.”
Albers, too, will miss her husband’s companionship and thoughtfulness: “I miss him and his laughter, among so many other things, but I know he is now in heaven and is in a better place and free of pain.”
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