Page 416 - WhyAsInY

Why (as in yaverbaum)
of our frequent Friday games that night, we convinced the tuxedo-clad Alan Weiskopf and his equally dressed-up wife, Leslie (who had arrived unexpectedly to say hello at about 5:30), to assist us in an impromptu practical joke. Before the Sternmans arrived, we had set the dining table, which was visible from the front door, with crystal, china, and silver, donned our own formal wear, and pretended to be shocked when they arrived in jeans. Bridge, we said, was for Saturday night. Hadn’t we told them? Then, on cue, Phyllis implored them, “Why don’t you join Rabbi Schwartz and the rebbetzin for dinner with us before we accompany them to our Brandeis fundraiser?” As she said that, Joel and Liz, who were undoubtedly not interested in being on their best behavior for the next hour or so, scrambled to make their excuses, and beat one of the hastiest retreats I had ever witnessed. Needless to stay, we stopped them before they got out of the driveway.)
Two or three rubbers later, the game had run its course as if nothing of consequence had occurred, and they got up to go home, somewhat amused, I think, that they had jointly and so unceremoniously dropped this bomb on us. Perhaps they had added that Liz would stay in their Scarsdale house with their children, Mark and Cheryl, and that Joel would move to Manhattan. But there were no additional facts or even an attempt at an explanation.
Joel and Liz were people with whom we had vacationed on a num- ber of occasions, and we had recently taken a weeklong trip with them to St. Maarten that was filled with nothing but warmth and laughter. We had followed up that trip with, among other things, an evening of laugh- ing again, this time at the slide show that I had put together, one that was accompanied by an absurd recording that I had made. We had had some ridiculous and memorable times with them. These guys were our friends, people who had shared an awful lot of their lives with us, we thought, and neither of us had a clue that anything was wrong in their relationship. In fact we had no real idea that people like them, people like us (!), actually split up. We were left completely stunned and dumb- founded by the way in which they had calmly brought the news to us.
• 398 •