Another Shiddukh Test...

Hattip: Frum Satire (This post was inspired by him and a recent conversation with Barak about hamische, aka "frummy" brands and their poor quality.)

A shiddukh "test" also apparently making the rounds involves pantry inspection. It's one thing to judge someone by the hechsherim they use, but something almost surreal to put emphasis on how much poor-quality food people will purchase.

How this works... 

[Buying Israeli like Osem or Elite does not count as "hamische", by the way.]

Choose the brand you would more likely purchase in the store (if given a choice)

Food Column A Column B

Ketchup Heinz/Hunt's Gefen

Mayonnaise Hellman's/Best Foods Unger's

Sandwich Cookies Oreo's Bloomy's

Salad Dressing Ken's Steak House Haddar

Microwave Popcorn Orville Redenbacher Mishpachah

Soy Sauce Kikkoman's Season

Cheddar Cheese Tillamook Miller's

Butter Land o' Lakes Morning Select

Pasta Sauce Barilla Mrs. Adler's

Potato Chips Lay's/Ruffles Lieber's

Results:

If you selected Column A, you are not "frum enough" since you give money to goyishe companies. (You should be ashamed of yourselves for daring to buy better quality food.) [However, if you have sons the same age as my daughters, let's talk shiddukh in 20 years! They are beauties, b'li ayin ha-ra and both want to be doctors, so they're smart as well.]

If you selected Column B, you feel you have something to prove to your neighbors. Even if a lot of these companies are goyishe, they cared enough about the kosher consumer to make tasty food accessible to us.

When It's No Longer Platonic

A thought-provoking post by JS on DovBear has prompted a long discussion about platonic relationships and their connection to Judaism. "Modern" Jews see no problem with male-female friendships. I accept that all of us are born with a yetzer ha-ra and it is up to us to learn how to control ourselves. The part I found most interesting in these recent posts (the point had been made by Tikun Olam) was that the Bais Yaakov girls (who hid it from their schools that they even attended these camps) were often the primary culprits of the activities in the bushes.

The charedim seem to have an awful lot to say about how "moderns" conduct their lives contrary to halakhah while "moderns" make a thing about charedim need to get "with it". I view charedim as taking strigencies and dressing it up as a part of the law. The "rules" were created when understandings were different. For example, it was relatively rare for men and women to interact on an intellectual level during the time of the Talmud. We live in a different world today!

With that being said, it's funny (in a sad way) when the ones pointing the fingers are doing the "crime". CBS2 ran a report today about inappropriate sexual relations occuring between married chassidic Jews. Many of them are escaping unhappy marriages, meeting up with random people on the Internet, and hooking up for sex. This is not occurring in that "orgy palace" of the UWS but in places like Williamsburgh. Generally, I respect chassidic Jews for their ability to keep their noses out of other people's business and conduct their own lives. VosIzNeias meanwhile is not sure how to handle a response to this report.

To be honest, it is a shame that the non-Jewish media exposed this "dirty" bit of information about religious Jews blatantly violating a mitzvah d'oraita (against marital relations with someone else's wife). On the other hand, perhaps this will allow people to focus within their communities and open up the gates of communication in marriage.

What is Frumkeit (really)?

Rabbi Maryles wrote a wonderful post about how praiseworthy it is to be a BT, yet we/they are treated as "defacto second class citizens" by many in the FFB world. For example, in our community, there is this FFB named "Golda".

Golda is the youngest child in a family full of rabbis, educated in a top-notch Beis Yaakov, and eventually married the "most frum" of a MO family (her brother-in-law was another early positive influence and a friend from college). Golda is extremely fascinated, to the point of being rude, with gerim and ba'alei t'shuvah. Upon discovering that a mutual friend of ours is a geress, she asked (in front of a large group of people) which traife food she "missed" the most. I really do not know what Golda is thinking with these questions. Tova (the friend) and I recently found out about another "stranger" in our midst (she told us because she is trying to make a shidduch for her daughter who converted as a child, over 10 years after the mother's Reform conversion). Tova joked that if Golda found out about this development, she might run to the lady's house and ask what pork tastes like or something rude to that effect.

Anyway, Golda seems genuinely fascinated by gerim and ba'alei t'shuvah because since she grew up in it, it seems odd that someone would "choose" to take this on. At the same time, she likes to "educate" us non-FFBs about the inner workings of the frum world. (Did I really want to know?) [At least twice, she has pointed out to me that one of her mother's ancestors was connected to "THE" Avraham ben Avraham, (of sefer fame)...Talk about riding on the coat tails of yichus.]

A recent simcha in the chareidi world may have changed Golda's perspective...She was snubbed at this party because amongst various reasons, it seems that she "married down" when it came to her husband (who, by the way, can boast of having had a grandfather who was a rabbi and a brother who is one), in the eyes of her mother's neighbors (and people she grew up with). This time, I gave Golda the education.

It seems that everyone has lost focus on what being "frum" means. So many people equate it with how many chumrot one takes on (or other meaningless external measures). First of all, my understanding of the mitzvot is that their purpose is to bring me closer to Hashem. My accountability (if I break one) is to Him, not to my fellow Jew (as much as some may want me to justify my life). I do sincerely believe that spirituality has died in so many people, that they may feel that taking on the most stringent rule fills them with a sense that they are getting closer to G-d (and keeping up with the Schwartzes on the chumrah of the month club).

Based on my bitterness about frum life (which I approached with open eyes), I have been asked why I bother. The answer is simple, which I told Golda. Golda did not have a choice to be frum, it's all she knows. I, on the other hand, chose to be frum because I wanted to have a closer relationship with Hashem and follow his mitzvot. I do this for purely selfish reasons and without a concern of other people and their relationships with G-d.

When They Were Young...

This post was inspired by a conversation I had today with one of my high school English teachers. She has since retired and is an adjunct professor in Holocaust Studies (as well as frum). I partially give her credit for where my life headed, as she was one of the first frum people I met that showed me it was possible to be a strong Jew and be "worldly". A large portion of my hashkafah came under her tutelage in high school. Yonina was bending my ear, sharing all the nachat she was receiving from her tribes of grandchildren. [One granddaughter, an officer in TZaHaL and frum, is engaged to marry another frum officer. Another granddaughter just graduated from our local chareidi girls' school and is heading off to seminary in Israel.]

Yonina: "It's the end of an era. For the first time in 52 years, one of my descendants will not be at ___________."

CYM: "A lot has changed in that time as well. Look how the hashkafah of the school changed..."

Yonina: "I have pictures of Rav D_______ before he grew a beard and was wearing sportscoats." [Rav D______ happens to be a descendant of a gadol that I do not wish to directly name as all will be revealed.]

CYM: "Everyone denies that ever happened, like when the school had mixed classes."

Yonina: "That was until the fifth grade. My daughter, 'Laura,' still remembers the boy who would pull her pony tail during class. Wouldn't you know, recently, Laura was talking to someone on the phone who had a familiar voice. After asking what his Hebrew name was, she realized that it was the same boy. My, how time flies!"

My conversation with Yonina reminded me of an e-mail that Esther had sent me some time ago. It must have been forwarded all over the Internet and blogged incessantly, but it is still appropriate in light of recent blogs on the chareidi world. [Rabbi Maryles and Barak]

An over-used cliche is that "clothes make the man". Would today's chareidim see future gedolim in (gasp!) modern clothes? Click on this link...

When They Were Young...

I welcome any feedback on when this change happened to Orthodoxy. What has been told to me by a friend (thanks, by the way) that it seems that the chareidim are trying to out-chassid the chassidim.

Post Pesach Re-Hash (one week later)

A struggle we all have as halakhically observant Jews is finding the line between halakhah, minhag, and chumrah. I do not claim to even have the first answer on the distinctions, but I do think that it is important for people to learn them. Being frum today involves knowing these boundaries and respecting them. Due to the Shoah, entire communities (and along with it, their m'sorot) are gone. The lines for Ashkenazic Jewry are so blurred. In my understanding, G-d gave us ONE TORAH. From there came Halakhah. This is something we follow since we are Jews. It's what we do and we do not wait for the kavannah to be right in order to do it. Due to our dispersion and relative isolation from each other, the leaders of our communities consulted the halakhah to ensure that the members of THAT community were following halakhah according to their understanding. Along the way people have CHOSEN to take on more than what was required for whatever reason.

In my effort to get healthier, I meet with other frum ladies for the united purpose of losing weight. Essentially, we are all friends but one in particular that I can most talk to, Rivki, said that as long as the conversation does not go into hashkafah, we're all set. This did not present itself so clear as when we started off sharing diet strategies for Pesach and ended up revealing our minhagim. Luckily only one woman seemed to feel (but did not vocalize it) that none of us were "making Pesach" properly.

This woman's family is not yekkishe but her father's father took on the minhagim in Europe. Upon arriving in NYC, he settled, where else, but Washington Heights. Her family has a "minhag/chumra" of only accepting KAJ hechsher for Pesach. I heard this story last year when she was telling me that the year she was engaged to her husband, her father would only allow her to eat by her chattan's family on the eighth day. Why? They willingly accept Manischewitz, which apparently, had a "concern" by the KAJ crowd years back. To her family, Manischewitz was "chametz". After marriage, she insisted to her husband that they continue to only use this hechsher on their Pesach products, including on (which I don't get this marketing ploy) "18 minute matzo". According to my undertanding of the halakhah, isn't kosher l"Pesach matzah BY DEFINITION REQUIRED to be out of the oven WITHIN 18 minutes or else it's chametz? [Please correct me if I am wrong.] I told her happily that I managed to "get by" on "regular" dairy products like specially labelled (but same price) cream cheese and butter. I only had to break down and buy "frummie cheese" when I normally buy other certified cheeses that I can find at Trader Joe's.

Rivki's family does not eat grebrokts because when her mother became frum, the rebbetzin kept the minhag. However, their father also decided to keep it. Her sister married a Farsi this year so immediately proceeded to kitniyot. Finally, a third lady who only knows Sephardi customs as she married a Sephardi after conversion in Israel, was surprised to hear that her house is not "chametz" to us, but to just skip the rice. [Her husband is friends with every Sephardi in town and tends to prefer his friends.]

My first significant frum rabbi experience was with a rabbi who does not eat grebrokts until eighth day. He knows that it is not chametz, but al yad sheni, it has been his family's custom. He instructed CYP and I specifically to NOT take it on.

In several recent posts, Barak has been echoing this theme in regards to the two day yom tov for us outside Israel, chumrot in kashrut that are causing the price of keeping kosher to sky-rocket. Minhagim seem to serve to divide us, but it seems to also cause us to look down on those whose customs seem meikel (leinient) or up to the more machmir (strict). A seminary girl from "the old neighborhood" one time told me that since we don't "keep chalav yisrael" then we don't keep kosher. Ironically, this is the same girl whose mother admitted to have purchased a local brand of ice cream that is chalav stam years earlier. (The entire family has been frum for generations, so it was not a matter of being ba'alei teshuvah.)

For some, grebrokts are presented in the same light. Orginially a chassidishe custom (in the Gemara, it is permitted to dip your matzah into water before eating if it is difficult to eat AT THE SEDER), it has also taken on a similiar air of being more machmir. One time, someone had said that this was the last year for eating matzo ball soup for the sedarim since the following year, they intended to not eat grebrokts, understanding it to be a "more frum" thing to do.

If our desire is to be "more frum" than there also needs to be an understanding of the hows/whys of what we do and not just assume that being frum means excessive hardships.

On Being a "Frumpy Frummie"

These are my long-delayed comments on the phenom known as a "hot Chanie", which is a young frum woman that "skirts" tznuit rules in the way she dresses, etc.

One of the most basic concepts every ba'al(at) teshuvah encounters is tzniut (modesty). When I was presented with the idea by some of my more frum acquaintances, it was defined as lengths of hemlines, shirt sleeves, and coverage of "sexy" body parts such as collarbones, elbows, and knees. It was, at best, over-simplified. After some consultation with a dear friend of mine, who is a rabbi, I was given his definition of tzniut. Words that he gave me included "modest in behavior and attitude", "dressing in an appropriate manner", and "not drawing attention to oneself with clothes". To me, this definition a more appropriate one of modesty.

At cool yiddishe maidel's school, there is a mother who identifies herself as frum who wears jeans, t-shirts (sometimes short-sleeved), and does not cover her hair. She is a humble person who does not dress in an overly-distinct manner. Contrast this to another mother who wears tight, high-end designer clothing that covers all the necessary body parts but is rude and crude in her manners and speech (her children are not at cym's school, I just have to encounter her at the kosher grocery store).

Tzniut is...
* wearing clothing that is appropriate to the setting
* conducting oneself in a way that does not draw attention
* conforming to dress code rules of your child's school at least when at the school
* looking polished and put-together without looking "sexy"

Tzniut is not...
* spending hundreds of dollars on a single outfit (when there are too many people who are living paycheck to paycheck without health insurance)
* being a show-off with your appearance (there's a fine line between self-pride and narcissism; Judaism is against avodah zarah, remember that!)
* turning parent-related school functions into a "hot mama" contest (it's just as embarassing to your child as it should be to you)
* (for married women, specifically) trying to snag a man with alluring looks and fancy clothes. Young women on the shidduch search should be given lessons for being attractive and tznua at the same time. It will be helpful for these young ladies to see the distinction between dowdy, baggy clothes, hair tied back into a pony tail, no make-up, etc and someone who can put themselves together without trying to be a frum version of Britney Spears. [A side note, a sheitel is worn to cover hair on a married woman without feeling "weird" in a hat or a scarf. It should not be more attractive than the hair that only your husband sees; since he's the one you should look sexy for, not other men.]

For more guidance about the hair covering issue, I recommend Hide and Seek by Lynn Schreiber. It is an essay anthology featuring both sides of the debate.

Do not hesitate to add more definitions to my Tznuit is/is not... I greatly appreciate any additional input.

(Blog Round-up) I Have NOTHING Interesting to Say...

so I won't say it.

I have not dropped out of the blog world, just that there has not been anything interesting to report lately. I'm going to work, attending grad school, and raising my children. Everywhere I go, I am looking for worthwhile topics; I just seem to be suffering from writer's block.

My fellow blogger, Esther, was very fascinated by the topic of "hot chanies" on Ask Shifra. This seems to be a topic that has taken off...to the point that someone has created a "don't hate me because I'm beautiful" response.

Outoftown has also chimed in on the topic of cliques and their evils. For a more up to date report, please read about her son's school's quest to bring more middot to the world.

Chana has arrived at an important point in her journey and we are all proud of her. (Im yirtzeh Hashem, we can celebrate in person soon.)

Hila has overcome the significant hurdle of telling her beloved father about her decision to convert to Judaism. His response was a reassuring one.

I didn't forget about you, Sephardi Lady. MAZAL TOV on the birth of your new little one.

Where Do Some Traditions Come From...

And How Do We Get Rid of Them?

[From now until Rosh Hashanah, I intend to make many of my posts about how to use the time during Elul to make us stronger people and better Jews. If we work on one aspect, the other will grow as well.]

Stop me if you heard this one... When I was a child, I saw my mother making the brisket for the seder and noticed that she cut the tip off of it. I asked her why, she said, "I don't know. Your grandmother always did it this way." At the seder later on, she asked my grandmother why she always cut the tip off the brisket. Grandma's response was, "I don't know. My mother always did it this way." If my great-grandmother had not already been in shamayim, she might have said, "Because my Pesadik pot was too small for the brisket, so I made it fit." (Yeah, I know, it's a classic, but will illustrate my point.)

Esther brought up in her blog recently how one may come about some of their minhagim. If not fully understood, it could blow up into entire chumras when its' origin came about as something practical, like cutting the tip off the meat. [In this case, her husband's towels covering the pots on Shabbat. We ended up joking about the thickness of the towels or even the color, white of course. If you use the wrong color, you could effect the chances of your children making good shiddukhim.]

One of the first major differences cool yiddish papa and I had to overcome involved the matter of housekeeping. While neither of our mothers could honestly be called balebustas, the approach that was taken with this in each of our childhood homes was different. My father hated messes and made it a point to make sure the house was not a mess at anytime. Mom, on the other hand, could not have cared less. In my house, things had to be put away IN THEIR PLACE when we were done using it. If we neglected to do so, we ran the risk of losing it forever.

This contrasted significantly with cool yiddish papa's parents. His father didn't seem to mind if the house was untidy and only when company was coming would his mother flurry around, stuffing things into drawers. So when we got married, I was shocked when cool yiddish papa offered to help me clean before Shabbat one week...until two days later, I tried to open a drawer which was crammed full of stuff.

I will tell you that we have struck a happy compromise with our house. He gets one drawer per room to stuff things into, but the rest have to have a definite purpose. That, I would say, was a easier resolution than some in my parents' marriage. After it ended, my mother has since become a major pack-rat and I believe that she is asserting her independence in the gesture of accumulating so much stuff.

As part of a recommendation to bring closure on some issues involving my father, a'h, someone suggested that I do some reflection on "family traditions", in a more universal sense than what food is served at each chag (a common argument with my in-laws since my mother's family are yekkish and my husband's family are litvish). Many families have problems that are "traditions", such as substance abuse, phyiscal/emotional abuse, or psychological issues. It is, in fact, more common to have a dysfunctional family of some sort than it is to not have one.

A "mesorah" which has not been properly passed down from many a father to his son is how to handle marriage, not the physical part but rather, being a good husband. Many of us have our parents as our best role models for how to be in a marriage. We are the ones responsible for seeing what we like and didn't and trying hard to have our own marriages be different (in whatever way) from that of our parents.

The first personal struggle cool yiddish papa and I had, after the drawer stuff, was how to handle personal space and independence from each other. I wanted it and he didn't. My father was an extreme of this type as well. He wanted the space for himself but not my mother. He kept track of all her friends and tried to curtail her social events that did not involve him. When some of my mother's friends would call the house for her, Dad made sure to not give their messages. [I wonder if this were happening today would he also go into her e-mail or check her cell phone messages.]

Eventually, she started to add it up when some people she genuinely liked (but Dad didn't) weren't calling her anymore. She was able to talk to them and discovered that my father, for whatever reason, wanted to isolate her from the "outside" world. It started to seem like she could only talk to "pre-approved" friends (one of whom eventually became his paramour, but that's another story) and my grandmother, who he apparently adored.

We discovered later on that my father was doing all of this to gain "control" that he felt he was continually losing in any situation. My father was someone who struggled with substance abuse, depression, and a weight problem for most of his adult life. The fight was finally lost to cancer when he was 59. He honestly felt that if he could "control" the people close to him in life, then they would be around to help him through. However, if he wanted the space, we all had to give it to him.

My mother's favorite story was about how Dad "kept" her from going to a PTA with pleas it takes too much time away from the family after she had been at work all day. Mom, always the martyr in the marriage, gave up her plans. How did they spend this "romantic" evening? Dad sat and watched TV, barely speaking to her. He didn't even notice when she went to bed. (This, I found out, was a frequent game played by my in-laws.)

My husband has tried a similar argument since I started going to grad school at night. After a long talk, he realized that I need my space in order to be a better wife and mother. His mother may have not minded staying home most nights and my mother may have been too weak-willed to stand up to my father, but that will not be me. I am working harder at coming to understandings in my own marriage. Cool yiddish papa's mother was just comfortable with status quo and my mother was too afraid that shaking things up would take Dad over the edge. We are finding the best ways for us to define our relationship to each other.

I am suggesting that each of us find a "mesorah" in our own lives, that just doesn't quite make sense anymore. It could be due to the fact that your children just can't handle the time frame or even your nerves. Look into yourself and see how you can "improve" on it, so it will eventually make you a better person.

How Much Information is TMI?

In this case, not enough!

A few weeks ago, Sephardi Lady wrote in her blog about protecting our children and ourselves from sexual predators. My post today, though, is about whether to accept that a person has made teshuvah or not, but what steps should happen if we are still leary. Every Elul, we evaluate our deeds (or misdeeds) and set upon a path for self-improvement which includes making sure that we act differently in the similar solution.

There's someone in my community who is not "officially" recognized as a sex offender but everyone knows about it. Depending on who is telling a story about him, it has rarely been positive. [I say "rarely" because an old Family "Friend" of cool yiddish papa befriended "Dr. Feelgood" after moving back to town and "FF" has been telling us sob stories about how no one understands Dr. Feelgood's pain.] Without solicitation, I have had it confirmed by many people who know him that in addition to having interest in children (his own), he abuses alcohol and heavy drugs, as well as pharms. A few years ago, he was investigated by the state medical license board but they did not see just cause in revoking his credentials. I found out that he is also serving as a distributer for pharms in the frum community. B'H, the families around his block have banned their children from even going into his yard. However, there are still those who know about him but are turning a blind eye to him because they do not want their children to participate in "loshon hora". [Two different sources confirmed that he gave his teenage son steroids so that he may gain weight.]

I am telling you all this because supposedly, he has "done teshuvah" for the child "problem" (separate from the drugs). Some rabbi (I doubt it!) has said that he is "cured" and okay to be around children. You see, my issue with that is first, being a predator is not like having a disease. Second, I don't think that a person who is feeling "repentant" would still engage in such behaviour.

Our Family "Friend" has been pushing for us to receive him into our home. When I cited my reasons (but did not discourage their friendship), he got into a major tirade that I know better than to listen to lies about people. In his version, nothing happened and his ex-wife "made the whole thing up" to make him look bad.) As it escalated, he told us a "story" about a friend of ours, seemingly set up to discredit him as well.

So, now I am asking you in the blog community, how much information should be put out there about people we believe to be predators? I am afraid of publishing his name here since there are those in my community who will approach me with accusations of spreading loshon hora. I choose to not identify my community but would be willing to write a blog detailing the info I do know about him so that parents can use their common sense to figure out if anyone they know should be kept away from their children. While the stories seem outrageous, I can't imagine people would be cruel as to make up such wild stories about this man.

From the Wolf..."What Judaism Is About"

Brooklyn Wolf got a lot of buzz about a recent post. To read, click http://http://wolfishmusings.blogspot.com/2006/05/what-judaism-is-about.html.

There are those who feel that the wolf and others like us are speaking lashon hara (or motzi shem ra) about our communities by blogging. Before I started this whole thing, I thought that I was the only one who feels the way that I do.

Wolf needed to say this to all of us, especially those of us BTs who sometimes question why we stay frum. There are some mornings I have to remind myself that this is for me (and my relationship to Hashem) not my neighbors. While I respect everyone's right to have whatever relationship with Hashem that they wish to have, I do not like these same people judging my own. I still do not see how cool yiddish papa's decision to not wear a kipa full time RIGHT NOW is connected to my ability to keep a kosher house. Yet, there are people who refuse to pay their employees (and falsify charges to prevent their ability to make a parnasah) who can have "full endorsement" from the local va'ad to open a new restaurant because he's "reliable with his kashrus." (I wouldn't trust his kitchen based on his conduct.) If an inability to conform to "frum dress" is considered being "lax" in other areas, what about being morally corrupt? What is not stopping them from serving Tyson chicken but telling people that it's, for example, KAJ-shechita? I will keep asking people why aren't people just taking the time to get to know each other before judging their frumness. As I said, if you are yeshivish and send your children to a cheder (then again, you might not be reading this anyway), it is your choice to have that lifestyle and raise your children that way. On the other hand, I am being the best Jew that I know how to be and every day, I am growing in this understanding. This doesn't make me more or less frum than you.

Please feel free to comment if you agree or disagree with me. I want to know if it's better to assume that someone is lax on their frumkeit based on external appearances or if you feel that trusting each other (unless the hard evidence proves otherwise) is the better way.

On Shidduch Dating...

Sephardi lady, on her blog, orthonomics, ended up talking about my next issue, shidduch dating. She wrote about the misguided idea of relying on segulot to help find a bashert instead of the "crazy" idea of picking up the phone and asking people out for dates.

I agree with her totally. However, not too many people in the frum world are about to do that. I think that extreme male/female segregation is causing a good portion of this situation (read brooklyn wolf about the tzius women-only mall in Israel as well as emes ve-emunah about the Gerrer Rebbe/Rav Aharon Leib Steinman's male-only first class flight to America).

I heard stories from an older friend who grew up frum (and left for a while). He came back because he married a BT girl. She showed him how much everything "changed" over the years. He told me that only a select few had separate seating/dancing at weddings. In fact, weddings were an opportunity for young people to meet other singles, hang out, etc. The chattan and kallah's families arranged for the young people to sit together at a mixed table. Now, you will be hard pressed to find casual events where single frums can interact with the opposite sex. We are at a point where we seem to be limited by internet sites, speed dating, and recommendations based on a resume.

I have been working with this girl (21) who was so embarassed when a boy approached her at shul, just to talk to her, that she pulled me aside and asked my help in getting rid of him. I told her that she has to talk to boys at some point if she plans on getting married. Her response was that she'll talk to them on the shidduch dates, but can't handle strange boys talking to her out of the blue.

What kind of future will the Jewish people have if the young people are afraid to even approach each other? There is not a segula in the world that can help if girls are running from a kiddush and boys feel like they can't even talk to a girl they like. Why do they have to jump through so many hoops to simply go on a date? It's situations like this that make me so happy that I met cool yiddish papa before there was ever an inkling that we would eventually become frum.

I strongly encourage any single person to approach that person that you like about a possible date. So what if it doesn't work...think about it as a learning experience for the next date. In my community, the local Aish Ha Torah minyan seems to be one of the places that the non-frum singles like to go to on Shabbat. There was one woman, 34 years old and still single. She looks pretty enough, seems smart enough, etc. I asked her what she was looking for in a husband. She gave me a laundry list that even included his profession (lawyer or successful business man). It made me feel sad for all the nice men she passed over for dates because they did not make (enough) money or the way she wanted them to make it. It's totally ok to require that your future spouse be a mentsch but it's not to ignore the teacher with the gorgeous smile because his investment portfolio is not big enough.