Page 502 - WhyAsInY

Why (as in yaverbaum)
At some unidentifiable point, I turned a corner, and finding a suit- able companion became a quest, a project, and one that was pursued out of need but not out of neediness. And those of you who know me, or who have been following closely, know that a project is something that I generally thrive on. So, how do you find a suitable mate when you’re in “midlife” but have come to believe that there just might be a future. Well, it transpires that there were five strategies:
First, there is the “fix-up” (which is actually the ultimate winner in my case), but, as I discovered, fix-ups are not a science. (Debby Korzenik fixed me up with four healthcare attorneys—every healthcare attorney in New York who was female, straight, and single it seemed [other than her boss, who was never suggested but whom I married].) Moreover, fix- ups are not entirely one-way streets. Far more often than not, the fixer-upper (no, we’re not talking real estate here, although in many cases, we might as well have been) is not, as you might have thought, acting solely for your benefit. She, and it is almost always a she, is trying to help her girlfriend far more than she is trying to help you. This, I believe, is not always the most productive of situations. You’re not a loser (in fact, you’re good enough, you’re smart enough, and, doggone it, people like you), but the woman with whom you’ve been fixed up is “very nice,” which just happens to be the kiss of death when the qualities of the date-to-be are ticked off in an effort to entice you to go forward. I am, as Kathy will aver, very shallow, and such qualities as looks are important (chemistry is key, you know) but are very difficult to inquire about. Here, the kiss of death is “She’s attractive,” which I guess is better than “She dresses very well” or the one that I would hear in college: “All the girls in the dorm love her; she does their hair on Saturday nights.”
But here, a joke—and I seldom repeat jokes—may be apt. Pretend that I’m telling this to you with the requisite Jewish accent and inflec- tion, and you’ll appreciate it more, if you’re going to appreciate it at all. In any event, it makes a point that is hard for me to disregard:
“A woman walks into a kosher butcher’s shop in search of a chicken for Shabbos dinner. Right in front of her is an open poultry shelf with piles of birds available for easy selection, and, without hesitation, she
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