ARGENTA - Janet Frye sounds like she stepped out of the plot for one of those Hallmark TV specials.

Growing up near Argenta, by age 14, she was childhood sweethearts with Kenneth "Kenny" Frye, the farm boy next door. Her idea of a hot date was helping him wash down his prize 4-H hogs before the county fair ¦ and years later, one of the champions would be sold to buy her an engagement ring. She got married in 1954 at the tender age of 18, the reception a cake-and-punch affair in her parents' basement and the honeymoon a romantic two-day sojourn at a hog farm belonging to friends in Missouri.

"Kenny helped them feed the pigs, and I learned how to make homemade bread," recalls Frye, 70. "And we could only stay two days because we had to get home and combine beans."

But love don't care too much for money, and Frye knew she had chosen wisely. Her husband worked hard at farming and several other jobs while Frye stayed home to raise their four kids. Later, when the children were older, she held down a 28-year career as a secretary in various offices of the Argenta-Oreana School District before retiring. Through it all, her marriage endured and strengthened. The man she married was not just her

husband, but always her best friend.

"We just had such a common respect for each other," she recalled. "It was beautiful."

And then the Hallmark plot took a tragic turn. Kenny Frye retired at the age of 62 but didn't get to enjoy many of his golden years because heart disease had begun to trouble him and would take his life just before Christmas 2001 at the age of 66. The sweetheart he left behind felt like she had slipped off the edge of the world.

"He had been my constant companion since my teenage years," she says, looking out at bright June fields through the window of the Sears farmhouse they shared. "When I lost him, I thought I had about lost my identity. I was like a fish flopping on the land. I got very mad at God."

She would read the Bible and go on long country walks to talk things out with her creator, and was comforted ¦ eventually. Frye learned that to everything there is a season, and we can't always know the answers to the big "Why?" and the big "Why nots?" of this life. What matters is the privilege of the time and love shared with those dear to us, and the memories we lay up like jewels in the treasure chest of the heart.

"So I kept praying and I would say to God 'Well, show me what I am to do now,' " she says. "I knew I had to replace that wonderful, positive thing I had lost, and I had to start finding out who I am."

The answer, surprisingly, lay invested at the Gerber State Bank in Argenta. Frye, who still owns two farms, had let it be known she might be interested in a little clerical work to get her out of the house and "connecting again" with people. Gerber called in 2002, and the then-bank president, Edwin Wallace, wound up offering her a job.

"I wanted to do a little bookkeeping, and he said we need a teller," she recalls, smiling. "You know what it takes sometimes in life? It takes someone else to move you along. Right then, Edwin had more confidence in me than I did because of the mental state I was in."

At sea in an ocean of other people's money, Frye swallowed her fear and learned to swim. She mastered the intricacies of telling and helping customers with everything from loans to IRAs to statements and all stops in between. Today, she regularly works six days a week, floating effortlessly between telling and bookkeeping and whatever else needs to be done, filling in for staff who are on vacation or whatever.

"I have found contentment," she says simply. "I love learning new things, I love the work, talking with the customers and being with my co-workers. I get a tremendous feeling of self-worth and value, it's wonderful."

And Gerber loves her right back. So much so, her colleagues nominated her for a special award, and Frye went right ahead and won it. She is now the Illinois Outstanding Older Worker for 2006 in something called the Prime Time Awards sponsored by Experience Works, the nation's largest provider of senior employment and training services.

Frye will be off to Washington, D.C., in October to be honored at a recognition ceremony along with 51 other golden workers from every state in the union. Gerber's current president and chief executive officer, Larry Bennett, says Frye has turned out to be one of the best mature investment opportunities the bank has ever had.

"We've taught her how to be a teller, how to do the bookkeeping and so on, and she has just grasped everything," says Bennett, 47.

"Now she's become a mentor to everybody. Other employees see how she takes an interest in customers, they hear her phone etiquette, see how she handles people, and some of it begins to rub off. We all realize how much value there is in older employees ¦ and she makes really great pies, too."

Frye says older people are especially conscious of two precious and finite assets, health and time, and they must spend them wisely. Right now, cashing hers in at the bank is earning a new lease on life that puts a spring in her step and a twinkle in her eye. But she knows exactly when it will be time to retire again: "Working is not an avocation, it's a privilege," she explains. "And the day when I can't give 150 percent is my last day."

Tony Reid can be reached at treid@herald-review.com or 421-7977.