A Conspiracy Theory

This one is dedicate to NMF#11 who got married last night and inspired it.
When young ladies return from a year of gallivanting abroad with approximately nobody keeping effective tabs on them, they discover that during their absence their parents morphed into controlling dictatorial types. For several months after that happy reunion (and the dismayed “My how you’ve grown since I last saw you”) different variations on “I’m a big girl I can take care of my own life!” ring frequently in the air. Where did all these irritating and pointless rules and restrictions come from, the big girls wonder. Why won’t their parents just let them do their own thing like mature, responsible adults?
Even the siblings pitch in. They were adorable the entire ten months of seminary. Suddenly they become irritating monsters with little respect for their sister’s privacy and needs. The big girls wonder why they didn’t dispose of them back when they were small and helpless, before they became big pains in the neck.
And slowly a truth congeals in their mind: their parents (conspiring with the siblings) are doing it on purpose. Their family is on a conscious crusade to make their lives miserable. Why? The answer is tied to another thought, sometimes exclamation, that these women make when particularly frustrated. The common theme here is “moving out.”

Oh those lucky out-of-town girls who get to live in an attic, free from the tyranny of the parentals! Those very same ones who bemoan their return trips home when they have to submit to house rules, and with gusty sighs and great rolling of eyes do what they’re told. Try it year ‘round, think the Brooklynites bitterly. But there are few good excuses for an aidel maidel living, working, and schooling in the same town as her parents to pick up and live elsewhere. In fact, there’s really only one.
Well, who can blame the parents? They want what is best for their children. They also wouldn’t mind not doing their laundry anymore, but really, that’s a side issue. They’re afraid a girl can get too comfortable at home, where all her needs are met with only a little effort of her own. And so they try to prevent her from getting complacent, for complacent people never move, never change, never go west and settle the frontier with mail-order brides. Or grooms, as the case might be. Point being, if you’re desperate enough, you might even consider getting married when you’re young, only halfway through a degree, and earning minimum wage. Dating will not be a nuisance that robs you of your evenings, but the equivalent of investigating a company for a job or a house for sale. It is a desirable means to an even more desirable end. It is the only way for a girl to get her freedom and independence—and in order for her to properly pursue it, she must be deprived of it to the full legal extent possible.

It seems inconceivable that NMF#11, a fiercely independent young lady who lets nobody cramp her style, should get married for any other reason. And indeed, she slipped the reason for her engagement casually in a conversation shortly after that happy event.

“I really wasn’t sure,” she explained. “But when my parents decided to replace the sefarim shelf in the dining room and moved the old one into my room for storage until they could figure out what to do with it… well, that’s when I knew it was time to get engaged. So I did.”
Im yirtza Hashem by every other so oppressed maidel.

The Bump Explained Phrenologically

Why do some girls wear bumps? What message are they trying to send?

Clearly that they are benevolent and full of veneration. For what, we are still investigating.

Date – It’s Mind Broadening

Let’s face it – family and friends can get a bit predictable. I mean, you pretty much know them already, and it’s rare they they truly shock you. That’s one nice thing about dating; you get to meet new people with different perspectives. This is the cause of “someone once told me” or “I heard somewhere” syndrome in young Jewish singles. Though, as one NMF’s husband told me, he still quotes former dates as “I once heard.” His wife narrowed her eyes at that.

Of course, most people prefer to meet new people with different perspectives without having to go through the discomfort of seriously dating them, but you gotta take what you can get.

For example, the guy who told me that my bank was about to go under. He was right; Wamu didn’t last 2 weeks. I’m glad, actually. Now I don’t have a bank with a silly name and I can use the Chase ATMs all over town. He was wrong, though, when he told me that I wasn’t as clever as I thought I was for locking my spare cash into the last 5% APR CD being offered in Brooklyn; he said rates would go up within a few months. Ha. Not likely. I’d laugh all the way to the bank, but I’m not sure which one.

Then there was the guy who moonlighted as a mashgiach. He said it got him great holiday getaways. Made me wonder if there were any waitress spots still available on the next Kosherica cruise. Hey, a girl’s gotta do what she’s gotta do.

One thing dating is good for is finding about different yeshivos. When I first started dating, people would tell me a guy’s Israel yeshiva as if it held some deep significance. Probably it did, but I had no idea what it meant. But just ask a guy about why he went to his yeshiva, and ask him why he didn’t go to other yeshivos, and you will get a very entertaining run-down of all the yeshiva stereotypes. The best is when you date guys from unfriendly yeshivos  right after another. Your  current date is essentially dissing your last date, but it’s ok if he dumps you, because the other  guy dissed him first.

There was one guy who made his mother spend 3 weeks canvassing my entire bio to make sure we were compatible. Then, on the first date, we got into a heated debate on the learning/earning subject.

“Should we be discussing this on a first date?” he asked me a few sentences in.

“Why not?” I asked recklessly. Why waste time? He’d made his mother find out every little detail of my existence, so there was really nothing else to talk about except him, and he was a 24/7 learner, so there really wasn’t much to talk about at all.

“You shouldn’t have discussed that on a first date,” my father concurred with a sigh. Sometimes he despairs of marrying off a daughter with as little common sense as myself.

“It doesn’t matter,” the shadchan told me afterward. “You’re in middle of a degree, and he wants his wife to follow him right back to Israel.” Now how did he miss making his mother find out that important piece of information?

But that date sparked a week-and-a-half long hashkafic convention at my house. It was all very educational.

Yep, there’s nothing like a good date to stir up one’s existence with new views and information.

OOT vs IT: part 2

And what does this have to do with shidduchim? A rhetorical question if there ever was one.

Because of these in-town/out-of-town stereotypes, people make stupid generalizations that simply don’t hold water. Let me put it this way: I have gone out with exactly one guy from the five boroughs in my entire life. I know quite a number from Brooklyn by default – they’re my neighbors and things. And I’m not getting this difference.

And let’s not forget the girls – or at least the crowd I met at Touro. They arrive in New York complaining about how much they hate it. They spend their entire stay making sure everyone knows they’re out-of-towners. Why? Because otherwise you couldn’t tell. They wear loads of black, they’re studying occupational therapy or special ed, they’re dating guys from Lakewood, Monsey, and Lander in Queens. And I’m guessing there’s a similar pattern in Stern, if I’ve seen a representative sampling.

Why did I get set up with these guys? Well, it could be that these guys failed to make the OOT grade, so the shadchan thought they’d do better with an in-towner. That could explain the lack of discrepancy. But seeing as I’m always being told that I’m OOT-type, I’m guessing the thought process was more about throwing two OOT types together.

I’ve seen that happen with plenty of my friends. They were all told they needed OOTs, and they all visited OOT shadchanim assiduously. One of them married the guy around the corner from her.

“He’s the only decent man in Brooklyn,” she confided to me. I met him, and I had to agree. He didn’t conform at all to the stereotype.

Then the next one got engaged to someone from the heart of Flatbush.

“I got the only normal guy in New York!” she crowed, when she told me the news.

I was inclined to agree with her too. He certainly did not conform to what Brooklyn guys are supposed to be like. Then another friend got engaged – to the only normal guy from Brooklyn. And then the next one informed me that she must have gotten the only mensch born in the five boroughs.

And a creeping realization came on… Being the only normal guy in Brooklyn must be something like being the best bochur in Lakewood. It’s a rare distinction, but somehow, there are enough to go around.

OOT vs IT: part 1

This post has morphed numerous times, and even though I’m still not overjoyed with it, ProfK’s post drives me to post it. Its most recent form began with the history of the term “out of town” as a reference to anyplace but New York City (it’s a NYC idiom about 80 years old), because many OOTs don’t seem to realize that it is not a pejorative invented specifically to demean them. The result, as you can see in the link provided, is a sort of reflexive instinct to insult in return.

I then went on to wonder what geographic borders OOTs are using when they complain about ITs; do they mean every community from the Bronx to Coney Island, or is it just Brooklyn, or is it just regions within Brooklyn, or is it pockets of communities they don’t like anywhere they find them, even in NJ? Because New York City has many diverse communities, and broad-brushing the entire city seems to fall under the sin of stereotyping and narrow-mindedness of which, according to the myth, only ITs are guilty.

Because here’s the myth:

Out of Towners are: friendly, polite, kind, unpretentious, open-minded, tolerant…trustworthy, loyal, helpful, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, reverent… (Yes, that’s the Boy Scout motto.)

In Towners are: unfriendly, rude, self-centered, showy, narrow-minded, intolerant, hedonists and gluttons…and that’s only the start. We are casual Jews who are obsessed with chumras, our women are immodestly dressed, yet the inventors of silly tznius stringencies. One person assures me that NY women can’t keep away from men; another complains that we won’t fraternize even with relatives of the opposite gender. If I were to pull together all the generalizations posted just on this blog about New York Jews, it would collapse into a comic farce of contradictions.

Where do these generalizations come from? If you closely cross-examine someone who has made a particularly ludicrous one—like the one that all women from NYC hang onto men—you find that the speaker has leaped to their judgment after meeting a small sample of NYers—often by staying within a small community or just visiting the same people every time they drop into town. In this case, the speaker had never actually been to New York, but was judging based on the women from NYC who passed through his small town. Another time, someone registered distaste for IT vulgarity—a disgust that built up through many repeated visits to the same relatives and their same shul, and somehow was projected onto all of the city.

I’m writing this for two reasons: firstly, because I’m getting quite sick of being insulted as soon as I say I’m from Brooklyn, and secondly, because, duh, this has shidduch ramifications.

First of all, I’d like to wax pedantic on this business of being open-minded and tolerant. If you divide the world into two types of people—out-of-towners and in-towners—then an OOT who despises ITs is no more tolerant or open-minded than an IT who despises OOTs. However, ITs do not despise OOTs—they just sometimes think they’re a bit strange—whereas many OOTs despise ITs reflexively.

Take the time I was at a party, and my friend was doing the introductions. “This is Friend A from Atlanta, this is Friend B from Boston, this is Friend C from Chicago, this is Friend D from Detroit… and this is Bad4, my friend from Brooklyn.”

There’s a laden pause. Finally, one of the Friends asks incredulously, “You have a friend from Brooklyn?”

“We go way back… I was different then.”

I tried very hard to look like the most narrow-minded one in the room, but all things considered, it was a doomed venture.

Or how about this terribly cute response when I answered “Brooklyn” to “Where are you from?”

“Oh I’m sorry,” responded one clever OOT.

“I’m not,” I replied coolly. I was glad I wasn’t from wherever he was from.

OOT is a term used enormously in the shidduch system. It’s an odd one, too. Because how can you lump people from all over the USA together? Even OOTs wills swear they’ve got nothing in common with each other… except they’re all different (read: better) than ITs. Well yes, that’s the point, isn’t it? If you don’t fit the stereotype, you’re OOTish. No matter where you’re from.

The OOT is in high demand. Like the guy in Washington Heights who is patiently waiting to meet a “cute, bubbly out-of-town girl” to marry. No cute or bubbly natives will be considered.

Speaking of cute and bubbly people, I met such an OOT in Touro once. She was wearing the Flatbush uniform, right down to the pleated black skirt and flats. “I dress like a New Yorker,” she explained, “But really I’m an out-of-towner.”

“Oh?” asked I. “And what does that mean, exactly?”

“Well,” said she, “I’m friendly.”

“Ah,” I said, and terminated the conversation because, as an in-towner, I am not friendly.

So is there really a difference between ITs and OOTs? I think not. Rather, it’s a demarcation of something else, that happens to bear the label IT/OOT. It is clearly illustrated in this conversation with an OOT:

“That bump [in the hair] is just a New York thing.” (Said in disdain.)

“I’ve seen it elsewhere,” I point out. “It’s become fashionable on both coasts and in between, for some inconceivable reason.” I begin to list the origins of people I’ve seen wearing bumps, which includes some bastions of Out-of-Town.

“It’s not the bump itself—it represents a mindset,” she explained.

A mindset—not a geography. So you don’t have to be from New York to be an in-towner.

You just have to wear a bump.

Pray for… Me?

I have commented a few times on the description of  singlehood as a tragedy, but recently someone sent me an anecdote that calls for a dusting off of some of those entries.

She’s on a mailing list that, every week, sends out a list of names for whom the recipients say Tehillim. The people on the list generally suffer terminal illness or face similarly dire circumstances. So she was a teeny tiny tad bit surprised, one bright evening, to glance down the list and find her own very distinctive name on it. See, she is still single, and doubtless needs praying for, but it seemed a bit demeaning to the rest of the list to have her problem equated with theirs. Oh, and also, who gave someone permission to stick her name on the list?

Disaster Out of Town

This was originally written for publication in the TC South newspaper, but like everything I write, wasn’t quite sensitive enough for the audience. I present it here in all its harsh glory, wishing myself better luck next time.

When I first heard about Touro College South I worried. It seemed to me that if the college succeeded, it would be a disaster. Bringing kosher college to the wilds of “out of town” could only cripple the chances of its students. Because then they can’t come to New York anymore. And deep down—though they all protest otherwise—they all want to be in New York City. Because they have to be. Here’s the view from Brooklyn:

When an out-of-town girl leaves to seminary it is a huge event. Ostensibly, she is leaving for ten months of study in the Holy Land, but in reality, this is the last time she steps across her parents’ threshold as their child; after this, she is an adult, seeking her own way through life, far, far from home. For when she returns, she will aspire to higher education, and because she will want it in a religious environment (if she doesn’t yet, she will soon), she will tread the path many have tread before – heading to the big city to seek her fortune via wisdom acquired in either Touro or Stern.

And so, her pre-seminary goodbye is an emotional one. Her parents are tearful, because their little baby is all grown up (and because how will they ever get the rest of the family to take over her chores), while her younger siblings grimly look forward to the contest over who will claim her newly vacated room and what contents they think she won’t notice are missing when she returns—oh so briefly—in the summer.

After a year or two of spiritual study, our Wandering Jewess’s path leads where all roads lead for the young and ambitious – to New York City, capital of the world. There, she will cram herself into an attic or a basement or an apartment with too many other young ladies just like her, earn her rent and sustenance money by day working as an assistant teacher or secretary, and study by night to be a variety of therapist or social worker, and dream of the day when she will leave New York for more friendly environs.

If, like myself, you have the fortune of having been born and bred in Gotham, you have ample opportunity to host these young ladies for Shobbos, and hear about their lifestyle that so resembles that of a Mexican worker.

Why do they do it? One can’t help but ask. “For the environment,” they reply simply. They leave out so much. Because it can’t be just for a kosher undergraduate degree.

When they finish their bachelor degrees, they go on to get graduate degrees from Hunter, NYU, Columbia, Downstate… all non-Jewish NYC universities. Why don’t they go home to Detroit, Chicago, Atlanta, and Philadelphia to finish their even-higher education? There must be another reason they’re here—a reason they won’t confess to, but is easily discovered by observing the out-of-town single in her non-native habitat.

There is one thing this young lady will do aside from work, study, eat, and sleep. There is only one other subject that occupies her thoughts and permeates her conversation. And it happens to be related to the largest advantage the New York Jewish community has over any other.

Dating. NYC is within driving distance of almost every major yeshiva and religious study program in the United States, and a whole lot of minor ones. When Single Men decide to settle down, they turn their eyes toward the nearest (and largest) concentration of religious single women in North America. And every eligible bachelorette wants to be there among the masses, jumping up and down shouting “Pick me!” when these young men scan the crowd, seeking their future bride.

That’s really why they come to New York. Touro is just an excuse. But with a Touro now in Miami, that pretext—at least for Miami residents—has been eliminated. No longer do they have a reason for living in high densities in New York apartments. No longer have they a reason for living on the same prairie as large herds of Single Men. How will they get married?

Do they?

How?

National Make a Shidduch for Chaya Day

Received an email with the above subject line. There was little content, only an attachment labeled “Chaya’s Shidduch Resume.”
Well, we’ve got a day of the year when we think about the Earth, a day when we carry around towels, and a day when we buy pink things that say “I love you” on them. Why not a day just about setting up one single girl?

Easy Way Out

“Why didn’t we check into the guy Bad4’s going out with tonight?” my father asked my mother in mild puzzlement last night.

“We check if there’s a second date,” my mother reminded him.

“Oh right, makes much more sense that way.”

“I could be going out with a psychopath and you wouldn’t know,” I pointed out.

“Oh I don’t think so. Uncle Joe knows the family and he says they’re very fine people.”

“And this saves us so much trouble if there’s no second date.”

“And if I don’t come home from the first, I suppose it saves you a lot more trouble?”

“Goodness, yes!”

Meet Dad

In all of history, the guy has had to leap the hurdle known as “parents” to get his girl. When arranged marriages went the way of stone-tipped weapons, suitors still had to knock at the door, bear the scathing elevator-eyes of the monster his damsel called “dad,” and answer any questions the man found relevant. Courting candles, the faher, and the curfew are only a few of the methods fathers have concocted through the ages to torture the knock-kneed lads who just wanted some time with their girls.

But why? Well, the excuse is protection. Before entrusting your princess to a total stranger, you want to get a good scan of his mug so you can describe him for the police sketch when they’re not back by midnight, or maybe pick him out of a lineup if your daughter has a horrible night. You also want to do your best to ensure that your daughter hasn’t wound up with a date that will end in either scenario. It is also important for the younger siblings to have a chance to whip out their field glasses and get a good look at the fellow, so they can make fun the next day.

Today’s modern women often work differently. But today’s women still have fathers from a generation past, and they must, as always, be humored. (“They didn’t do it that way in my day.”) Also, the average father doesn’t realize that his daughter is, in fact, a grown woman, and can’t get it out of his head that some guy is coming to steal his baby away for an evening, and maybe a lifetime. (“What do you mean you’re an adult? I remember changing your diapers just a few years ago!”) In addition, many doubt the best judgment of their children for what seems to them good reason. (“Trust her to choose a mate? Remember when she tore a tendon skiing, but kept going all day because she didn’t want to waste her vacation in the ER? I wouldn’t trust her to cross a two-way street without holding a responsible adult’s hand!”) Or they want to know information their daughters might hesitate to ask about for any number of reasons. Parents have a powerful veto on the acceptance of proposals, and some might even threaten to use it.

Women today are liberated, don’t feel any great need for protection, and are independent enough to manage their own affairs. A great many don’t live at home. As such, the first-date meeting is, in many communities, going the way of the arranged marriage. But it is widely accepted that a couple meet each others parents before engagement.

But when is that? For some, it’s sometime between the proposal and the “official” announcement, and the reason for the “unofficial engagement” phenomenon. But others have their own, sometimes humorous ideas of when the meeting should take place.

NMF#6 had one date take her to a restaurant for a dinner date. Oddly enough (and purely coincidentally, her date assured her) his parents happened to be there too, and just a few table away. Introductions all around. She was not pleased.

Another young lady’s date was somewhat more forward. On the third date, he took her to meet his parents. When she asked if he thought things weren’t progressing a bit… too quickly, he just looked puzzled.

Of course, if you’re going to meet his parents, it should be at a happy event. Like your date’s one-year AA anniversary.  One young lady first met her prospective in-laws when her going-steady date wanted everyone important to him at this momentous occasion.

The Suit – Wear or Beware?

I know that before even reading anything, about half of your pointers are over the comment button and you’re ready to type out a message that could be distilled into “I think suits on dates are stupid.” I know you do. This post is an explanation of why some people think they aren’t, and indeed, consider them essential attire for the young man when he first shows up to take out a prospective.

There are three reasons to wear clothing. The first is utility. Clothing protects one from the elements, and specific clothing may be necessary to do specific work, such as overalls for a chemical plant operator or a big plastic suit for those who work with biohazards. For those with white collar jobs or who aspire to vocations in Talmudic study, a suit is such a work-mandated uniform. Therefore, a suit serves almost the same purpose as the antelope dinner did to Igga—it demonstrates what the wearer’s social demographic and/or income bracket looks like. Of course, anyone could just buy a suit for dating purposes. However, the parents of daughters are sure that young men will understand instinctively, even if they are not well-read, the advice of Henry David Thoreau, “Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes.” If you need to buy clothing to date, you’re probably looking in the wrong place.

The first blends with the second reason to wear clothing: affiliation. A kilt affiliates one with a Scottish highland clan, whereas baggy, beltless pants affiliates one with prison inmates. A suit, for the student of Talmudic Law, shows his affiliation with the community of Talmudic Lawyers. (You can usually differentiate these from the American Lawyers by the color of the accompanying tie.) Other communities may dress up by wearing pink shirts or tan chinos or any number of other ways. Showing up in a suit demonstrates that you affiliate with the suit-wearing crowd. If “dressed up” and “suit” do not coincide in your mind, then do not bother to court someone from the suited crowd. They will be peeved from the very first expansive sight of your shirtfront. If “dressed up” and “first date” do not coincide in your mind, then either skip to reason three, or skip this post entirely.

Reason three is oft-forgotten. I was reminded of it a few Shobbosim ago while admiring the beautiful yet practical layout of the Breuer’s shul in Washington Heights. “When I grow up, I want to be a yeki,” I decided impulsively. Then I noticed the things that were obstructing my view of the layout—namely, the men. Or what was on them. I noticed that, oddly enough, their suits fit. There were no vertical or horizontal wrinkles in the backs I was looking at. Jackets didn’t hang from shoulders as if from hangers. Pants broke neatly across well-polished shoes. It was a lone outpost of non-lawyers who could wear dress pants and concurrently look well-dressed. There was a sartorial symbiotic relationship going on down there—they dignified their clothing, and their clothing dignified them.

Which is the point. The point of wearing clothing, the point of wearing a suit, and the reason for both of the first two reasons for wearing clothing/suits. (Yes, that made sense. Just reread it if necessary.) By dressing in a dignified and handsome manner, you show respect for yourself, but even more so, to the people who have to look at you. Dressier clothing means the date is more important to you and that you ascribe more importance to your impression.

Or else that you heard you have to show up in a suit, so you did.

Why Eat?

Every now and then you get a guy or girl who wants to know “Why?” Meaning, why do we have to do things this way? Just because everyone else does them that way? So what?

They assume, in a typically youthful American way, that simply because it’s always been done that way it must be worthless. This is an attitude designed to be diametrically opposed to the “it’s always been done this way, therefore it’s right” attitude, and therefore, is just as silly.

True, much of what we do is tradition. But traditions have sources, reasons why they exists. And for many aspects of dating, things have always been this way because it’s a good way to be. Let’s examine the history of several of these traditions and see why:

Taking a Girl Out to Eat

Ever since Ugg first crawled out of his cave and saw Igga untangling her hair on a rock, he’s been trying to persuade her to marry him. But Igga wasn’t stupid. She knew better than to hitch herself to a man who couldn’t provide. And so, it became traditional for a caveman to court his cavewoman by taking her on a date. They’d walk out on the savannah, he’d bring down an antelope in a mighty show of brawn and skill, and then they’d have lunch together, discussing their personal philosophies and plans for the future over roast venison.

As history progressed, the pattern changed. Cavemen appointed managers to organize woolly mammoth hunts. The manager got the best cuts, and therefore, the best girls. As history progressed and farming came into fashion, it was the man with the biggest crop who caught the women’s eyes.

The details change, but the theme continues on. For example, Regency gentlemen threw parties where they impressed the women with their opulence and their dancing. And nowadays, a man shows how much he can swipe his plastic by taking a girl out for a meal.

Is it still necessary, though? After all, a man doesn’t need to literally bring home the bacon any more. There are better ways to gauge his income potential.

This is true, but eating is still the single most entertaining way to pass time ever since the Garden of Eden, when that forbidden fruit caused so much excitement. Food also makes people happy, which makes them more inclined to look graciously upon the person across the table from them. Eating, therefore, is not likely to disappear from the list of dating venues any time in the foreseeable history of the universe.

Next: The Suit – Beware, or Just Wear?

Just a P.S.

…the last line of last post was not completely random. I have a friend who, quite literally, started behaving like the worst sort of NMF when she started college. She never shows up to any event during the semester or participates in anything that would keep her away from her books. People started scheduling their weddings for winter and summer break just so she would show up.

And that last detail is the salient one. Because we keep chasing her. Even though I think it’s a extreme and unreasonable behavior, but I still like her, and I still want to see her, and am willing to jump through hoops for the pleasure of her company.  With married friend, singles are often shy of chasing, figuring “Hey, if she’s too busy, forgetaboutit.” But perhaps a willingness to jump through a few hoops could save things. People can get weird about some things, but generally they get over them with time and patience.

An NMF Explains

It’s an old topic, but bears flogging because it comes up all the time. Why do NMFs seem to drop their friends? Do they?

NMF#7 has something to say about the matter. To her credit, when we chat, it’s usually me who has to leave. I got married to college a year ago, and it’s a very demanding spouse.

Diagrams

This ‘toon here (thanks, Ez), reminded me of a post I’ve been thinking of now and then. It’s short and simple and doesn’t take much writing, so here goes.

E is an old friend of mine from way back. We share some friends, also from way back. We also both have many friends we don’t share.

This diagram is of each of our pools of friends coming out of seminary. Blue stands for friends who are single. Green stands for friends who are married. If it isn’t clear yet, most of my friends are married, and those that aren’t, for the most part, are also E’s friends. E has many other single friends. Which makes me wonder – is E a segula for staying single?

It should be noted that E is happily married herself.

Now, E belongs to a (this is painful, but sometimes labels are useful) more modern community. So do many of her (non-mutual) friends. This would suggest (from within our sample, which is obviously not random) that certain communities have a larger shidduch crisis.  But our mutual friends, for the most part, are more to my end of things. This could suggest that E attracts weird, messed-up people who are incapable of forging long-term bonds with members of the opposite gender. Or wonderful people too ’special’ to be easily appreciated. Or… or…

I don’t know, but it sure is weird.

Cowardly?

Asking someone out via text?

Hat tip to O, Queen of Links.