Matchmaker

Fall is such a beautiful season. The leaves turn magnificent colors. The air is cool and crisp. It even smells better. It is only ironic because the word “fall” is really one you never want to use, at least as a verb. As I get older, I fear the word “fall.”

While I was away, one of my walking friends took a fall, and now we cannot walk for a few weeks. Can I blame my recent weight gain on her fall? Nooo, that would be “so silly,” as my edible Danish would say.

I usually walk looking down, not because I don’t want to see anyone around me, but because I am so afraid of falling.

See what happens when I am not sure what to write about? Just kidding. Here we go.

The year was 1991. I was on a bus to Washington with other Yeshiva College and Stern College for Women and some other students. We were going to some rally for some cause. Forgive me for not remembering the cause. In any event, there was a lovely boy on the bus who kept talking to me.

Because I have such high self-esteem, I thought the boy was going to ask me out and I really didn’t want to hurt his feelings, so I started talking about my amazing roommate, and was he interested in being set up with her?

I set them up. They got married. When I went to the wedding, I was so moved by the fact that everyone was there because of something I did. Two families becoming one — blah blah blah. The couple never really thanked me, but I knew what I did. And God knows what I did. So I got over it. (No, really, I got over it.)

The year was 1994. I went to a party in the city with my friend. Yes, nice Jewish girls went to parties with nice Jewish boys. That is how people used to meet. But that is a whole other column. My friend was wearing a really cool green dress. Very modest, and very different in style. Party is over, we all go home.

That Friday night, I am with my friends at a Friday night dinner at another friend’s apartment. He has a friend over who is visiting from Boston, where he was attending law school.

We are all talking to him and asking him questions, and one of the questions was, “Are you dating anyone?” And he says, “No, but I was at a party the other night, and I saw a girl in a really cool green dress. She was beautiful.”

Yes, that was my friend. I called her after Shabbos to ask if I could give her number to this guy. My exact words to her were, “You are either going to marry him or never speak to me again.”

They got married. They moved to Israel. He is now a rosh yeshiva in the Old City. Baruch Hashem, they have many children and grandchildren. Yes, they thanked me. In fact, six years after they married, she called me to say, “Our rabbi told us that we need to buy a gift for the person who set us up.” And they sent me a beautiful necklace.

Whenever I see their kids, they know that I am the person who set up their parents. It really is an incredible feeling.

Why am I telling you all about this? Well, Matzo Ball and his parents are in town for a week. Why? Because Matzo Ball’s aunt is getting married, and Matzo Ball’s father, my Son #3, is the one who set them up.

It makes me so happy to know that his future brother-in-law was his friend first, and it makes his mother-in-law so happy that he set up her daughter, because a happy mother-in-law means a happy wife, and a happy wife means my son is happy.

May the new couple be blessed with only good health and mazel and may we all try to set people up, because you never know…

Banji Ganchrow of Teaneck will be babka-sitting for Matzo Ball at the wedding and probably won’t let anyone else hold him.