On the Dating Scene

A-Plus: 3 Weeks, 5 Days

 

"You know," cousin Galila tells me, "I really miss my friends."

Thinking back to the constant parade of parents either picking up or dropping off her kids' friends leaves me a bit puzzled. 

"No friends?  And what about all the people who drop by to say hello."

"I mean," she says, "I still see them, but all they want to talk about is you.  How old are you, what do you do, are you single?"

 

Later in the day, cousin Rafi and I walk out of my landlord's house after settling some contract issues on my lease.

"You saw his wife there, sitting on the sofa?" he asks me.

"Yeah."

"You know what she was saying when you weren't looking?" he asks, giggling, "'Does he have someone!?!  I have someone for him!'"

 

"Are you single?" is the second question I'm asked when I meet someone new.  It usually comes right after "What's your name?" but before the handshake is over.  Everybody from the Chief Rabbi to the cab driver wants credit for making a successful shidduch.

Often times, it's taken a bit too far, along the lines of, "Wait a minute, you mean you have ears?  OHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGOD!!!  She has ears too!  It's a shidduch!"

 

When offered a date, I have been responding, "Just let me get a roof over my head, start living some sort of a routine, and get myself settled."

 

But I was going though a tough time this week from work, feeling a little down in realizing that it's not going to be quite as easy as I thought, assuming I can even continue with my job long-term.  Then I get a call from my rebbetzin (rabbi's wife) in Be'er Sheva, from when I was a student there four years ago.  With a shidduch.   I've had a lot of offers, but she doesn't usually try to make shidduchim, so I know that this isn't just mixing a random sample from the male and female species.  She called three times.  The line that finally broke my resistance was, "Your wife is just wandering around out there, lost and waiting, and you're sitting around doing nothing about it."  Could anyone with a soul resist that sort of guilt?

 

So I decided, "What the hey."  My place isn't set up, I don't have a routine, but it's time.  Called my date up and we went out today.  We had a good time too, but, despite the great writing material it might make, I have decided to initiate a policy of not writing about my dates.  First off, these are very kosher, modest girls, and it would be insensitive of me to do so.  Secondly, as a rule of thumb, don't write about relationships if you don't want to lose them.

 

But it was great to break the ice.  Now I'm really here!  There's a saying that, due to the incredibly fast pace of events here, one month in Israel is like one year in America.  During my entire four and a half years in America, I went on a grand total of one date.  It lasted an hour.  So as far as I'm concerned, I've been here less than a month, and it's already like four and a half years in America.