Tangled: Complicated Matchmaking

By Gitty Gold

Tangled, by Gitty Gold, presents a fascinatingly fresh and unconventional glimpse at the orthodox life in ultra-orthodox Bnei Brak, Israel. With four siblings over twenty unmarried, including himself, the protagonist, Gavriel, becomes a successful matchmaker, a sure winner for good reading.

There is much humor, insight, philosophy on life and people in a book with lots of interesting surprises which include a trip to the salt mines of Romania, a Nazi criminal hunt, a well kept family secret and many other unexpected tangled strands of a yarn to lead the reader on and on to a satisfying ending.

Other Books by Gitty Gold

Hints from Paris

A Peek Into My Life

A Strong Opinion

A Family Like This

To My Daughters, With Love

Tangled (English Version)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris AU
• Release date: May 3, 2013
• ISBN: 9781483612621

Book preview

TANGLED

COMPLICATED MATCHMAKING

GITTY GOLD

Copyright © 2013 by Gitty Gold.

ISBN: Softcover 978-1-4836-1261-4

Ebook 978-1-4836-1262-1

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Rev. date: 03/20/2013

Xlibris Corporation

1-800-618-969

www.Xlibris.com.au

503400

Contents

The Sandwich

Bubbe Meisses

I am the Shadchan

Blood is Not Water

A Taste of Gan Eden

Cheesecake or Chocolate Cake?

No Surprises in a Yeshiva Salad

They Refuse to Share With Us

Gili Listens Avidly

Reality Defies the Imagination

Ach—From Gemach to Gemach

The Last in Line

To Thank and Praise, While Continuing to Pray

In Abba’s Merit

Pesach Without Abba

After the Shloshim

A Widow’s Tears

I Despise Hypocrasy

Completing Shas

Torah and Its Reward

Elul

Where Is Everybody?

Intensive Care

The Jewish People are Holy

Take the Glory of Sons…

Everything Under Control

All is in Heaven’s Hands

Nonsense and Foolishness

Winter is Suddenly Upon Us

What a Speech!

A New Jewish Family—But Where?

Maria Christiana

You Will Never Have Children of Your Own

Why? Why?

House of the People

Rudolf the Terrible

Avrum Nechemya and Nana Salomon

Other People’s Problems

A Houseful of Girls

The Last Time

Pesach 5746

An Order of Preferences

A Change of Place, a Change of Fate

Thank You, Abba

Chana Does Not Usually Cry

A Massive Wave

What Will Hershel Tzvi Say?

Only Aunt Chana Knows

Something is Pricking My Eyes

Demolishing in Order to Build

I’ve Learned Something in Life

GLOSSARY

I feel like a little boy but by us, we get a special treat on Rosh Chodesh: a cup of hot milk with a bar of chocolate that melts inside, creating a divine taste of Gan Eden… I don’t know who invented the recipe but I promise you that it’s a tested formula for shalom bayis. There isn’t anyone in the world who wouldn’t melt with a cup of real hot chocolate like this.

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Does anyone think I slept last night? I am more confused than ever and can’t begin to understand my mother’s monologue. It’s altogether beyond me. That such an interesting story should come the way of a curious fellow like me and that I be forbidden to ask, investigate or explore the subject borders on the inhuman. I am being punished twice over; the first time when my heart burst at the sound of my mother’s sobs and the second time, having the reason behind it withheld from me.

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Begrudging people even went so far as to spread the rumor that there was a quarrel between the two sisters, Tzila and Chana, regarding the shidduch. The one sister is getting married a second time while the other remains an old maid… Tzila and Chana explode into laughter, like in their youth. Nonsense and foolishness and idle gossip.

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So some nosey body is taking the freedom to prying into her affairs. Tzippy feels a cold sweat coming on and tears forming in her eyes. This type of question disturbs her. Who did your packing? What do you have in your baggage? Who saw you packing? Where? Did anyone give you anything to take along? Perhaps someone put something in that will endanger the passengers?

SANDWICH—a fascinating book, written with a refreshing candidness that combines a joy for life with an acknowledgement of difficulties and failures, touching on sensitive points involving shidduchim and checking them out; stigmas and social conventions; relations between parents, children and married siblings, but above all the thread of optimism and determination to stick to one’s goals runs through the book.

This book joins the unique writing style of Etty Abramowitz’s previous book, One Family. A peek into the life of…

With thanks to the Creator Who brought me this far

To my parents, and their tales of Romania, of times and places afar

To my family who encouraged, read and offered advice

And to Sudy Rosengarten, for her moral support and added spice

Special thanks to the wonderful Rebbetzin Sheindel Weinbach that proofread the book with great devotion

To Avrum Nechemya who leaped from the Tea Tree—my thanks

For he really enlivened this book with his pranks

To Chana o.b.m., who morally supported the family so much

And Tovi, to whose noble character deserves a gentle touch

And last but not least, to Gavriel, a true mensh

Who deserves his honorable mention

THANKS

1 The Sandwich

5740

Even though my real name is Gavriel Goldschmidt, I have always been called Gil. The ones responsible for this nickname is my sister, Gili. A year and a half older than me, she found it easier to call me Gil and herself Gili. Tzippy, the oldest one in the family, is three years older than me and Esty is two years younger. Tovi is four years younger.

My parents were blessed with four fine daughters and one unique son; me, of course. If you’ll notice, in this sandwich, I’m the spicy spread, the family pet, the favorite son around whom everything and everyone revolves. They worry over me, bake for me, do my laundry, iron my clothes, teach me—but most of all, are determined to educate me!

Not only was I blessed with great parents, and over the years, with wonderful kindergarten teachers, rebbes, mashgichim and roshei yeshiva, but also with four katchkes, tchatkess [geese and/or treasures] or whatever you want to call my doting sisters, who stifle me and don’t give me a chance to develop my own personality. But I have my own way of working around them, my special masculine methods and mechanisms of self defense. On the surface, I pretend to agree with them, appease them, give in to their whims and meshugassen, and let them spoil me and think they can make decisions for me.

I have never had to pack my own suitcase; I’ve never ironed a shirt or gone off to yeshiva without a full arsenal of cakes and cookies which they devotedly fought over the privilege of baking for me and presenting according to their individual esthetic taste. They compete for my attention and favor.

Today, we are all candidates for shidduchim. Tovi at the tail end is only eighteen; next is Esty, 20, myself aged 22, Gili at 23 and Tzippy, leading at 25. And all of us still at home!

Tzippy, a fantastic graphic artist, working full time in a publication house, has been in shidduchim for the past six years, is sadly experienced in checking up prospective candidates, dating and disappointments. I really feel for her; she is a quality contender who only wants to establish a true Jewish home with the right person, someone who will suit her requirements, her personality and fit in with our family. I think she’s tops, but of course, being her brother, I guess I’m prejudiced.

Gili, who graduated Teachers’ Seminary with excellent grades but without the right connections, ended up working in a shoe store. She isn’t worried yet because our family policy is not to skip over anyone, so that she will have to wait her turn. Some of the shidduchim suggestions were tempting but were turned down. Gili doesn’t have high aspirations; she’s a standard girl looking for a good boy, not necessarily `the best boy’ or someone especially brilliant. Someone like her. Normal.

I’m 22 and I’m not dreaming of getting married before my older sisters. In fact, I’m not at all in a rush. Our home has a nice, warm atmosphere; we’re a happy family and up till now, no one was particularly pressured, though we know our parents would love to have grandchildren already.

Every shidduch suggestion is carefully examined in a family council. Since there aren’t any little children around any more, we have no secrets. The family seforim store keeps my parents busy full time, and we children help out during vacations and when there’s a lot of pressure.

My parents are Holocaust survivors, simple folk who were never interested in politics. They don’t express an opinion, never argue with anyone and distance themselves from arguments and dissension as if it were fire.

Esty keeps the financial records of the family business in her free time; actually, she has a regular job in a large office and expects a promotion soon.

Tovi is the only one who is still in seminary, with two more years to go in her special education course. She complains about a heavy school load and we try to ease things for her at home, excusing her from her turn at washing dishes and shopping. Chores that I am totally exempt from, of course. Tovi is still involved in her school social life and dearly attached to her best friend, Sheindy Shmulevitz. You could almost call them Siamese twins, as they are rarely apart and when they aren’t together, you can be sure they are gabbing on the phone. None of my other sisters were such chatterboxes, and we can’t help teasing her about her shadow.

Were it not for our parents’ pressure to get us to the chuppah, we wouldn’t be disturbed about the trickle of suggestions coming in for Tzippy. We take these things in stride and look at the positive side, but not so our mother, who is really stressed about the situation. In fact, extremely so.

Whenever Tzippy goes out on a date, we all go into an emergency mode. She is the sole object of everyone’s focus from the time she comes home from work until she steps out the door. We hover around her in a frenzy of activity, as if a Jewish home depended on all the material trappings and a fine presentation. I’m not supposed to know about anything, since my parents would surely not call me at the yeshiva to let me know she’s going on a date. But I have my antennae tuned and my parents do rely on my opinion on the modern-day yeshiva bochur. The yeshiva is my world, after all, and it is much easier for me to gather detailed information from the inside which they would never get by calling an acquaintance.

To tell the truth, I hate this. I detest the answers which boys give when asked to provide information. You can’t always tell the truth but neither do you want to ruin someone’s chances, so you just keep quiet about certain things and marriages are made on the basis of incomplete data.

On the other hand, the girls aren’t idle either. When it comes to information—everyone is `tops, smart, refined, a real tzadekes, talented, modest’ and so on. I am personally repelled by the excessive focus of girls on clothing and appearance. I am sickened when I see my sisters spending so much time on their looks. There’s a hysterical element to this dressing up and doing their hair, like an impersonation of something they aren’t. It doesn’t make sense; it even repels me, and if this is what goes on with fine, intelligent girls like my own sisters, I am afraid to think of the situation with girls of lesser caliber and character.

I truly love my parents and my sisters, but I can’t stand all the commotion surrounding the preparations for the date. I prefer the way my sister looks on a regular work day, without all the frills and makeup.

You can be sure that I wouldn’t voice this opinion in my home; it would be tantamount to treason and terribly unfair to my devoted sisters who do so much for me. But that’s what I really think, and I pray three times a day, if not more, that when my turn comes, I meet a normal, regular girl who doesn’t make a fool of herself like other girls. I want to see a girl the way she looks on a usual day, and not faint after the wedding when she begins peeling off all her masks…

When I think about my sisters in their normal pose and not the way they look before a date, but simple and modest, I feel sorry that I can’t talk to them directly and give them a piece of my mind. When I imagine myself going out with a girl, I am sure I won’t be able to concentrate on what she is saying because I’ll be altogether up-tight and nervous. I don’t think I’ll have the nerve to look in her direction, so that it won’t even make a difference to me what she is wearing as far as my impression of her is concerned. You can understand that my daily contact with my sisters in real life makes me stand with my two feet on the ground. I am very familiar with feminine habits, language, talk and even diets, so that no one can fool or deceive me.

I am busy all the time with my inquiries. Every name suggested by a shadchan for Tzippy, Gili or Esty has to undergo my crisscross inspection to evaluate what the candidate is really like.

I’m not lazy. My sisters deserve the best and being on the inside, in the yeshiva, I am able to do my checking better than anyone else. First of all, I find out if the boy shows up on time each morning for minyan, learns for real and doesn’t just lounge around and socialize.

I have to take into consideration whether the guy is compatible with my sister. If the answer is no, it’s no. I know the boys well and I can’t stand the thought that my serious, mature, responsible sister would establish her home, and may it be the sooner the better, with an immature and spoiled fellow. Like myself, for example…

I’m not just saying this. I know the boys from close up and I am really concerned and worried. I, myself, at the age of 22, have never done anything else with myself except for studying. That’s a good thing, for sure, because that is my task in life, but on the other hand, I have no preparation or knowledge of how I am supposed to establish my own home. What are my aims, my direction? I have never been exposed to the world of employment. I have never earned a shekel or needed to appease anyone. My life is okay and well organized. When I think that some fine day I will have to pay grocery bills, I realize that anything off kilter in my marriage could cause disharmony and imbalance.

I don’t feel mature enough to let a young girl rely and depend on me. I think that there is something wrong in establishing a home in such a distorted manner, when I can’t even rely on myself to steer the family ship.

Meanwhile, I play my part like a rooster in a henhouse, and let myself get carried away with the general excitement, with the ongoing checking up for my sister, and the steady prayer that when my turn comes, it will be different, that I will be more mature and gain a kallahh who truly suits me, one who will value my learning and my investment in learning, and not just the outer, insignificant material trappings.

2 Bubbe Meisses

Winter, 5741

Now don’t get me wrong. I respect and revere talmidei chachomim, and aspire to be counted as one of them. I am a serious `learner’ and can truthfully be called a masmid. However…

I’d like to tell you what happened to some of my masmidim friends, the top guys of my shiur in yeshiva who got married last year and two years ago. After a very lavish wedding and being endowed with an apartment bought by a father-in-law for a whopping price which almost cost him his life, these guys make every attempt to apply themselves to their studies. Some of them are successful, but you can’t compare a kollel to a yeshiva. After you find yourself married, supplied with an apartment and you’re lucky to have found yourself a good kollel as well, no one is there to pressure you or to give an accounting to. You’ve become your own boss, even to your wife. And here is where the real test materializes.

My impression may be lacking important facts but this is how I see things:

It doesn’t take long for the young chosson to realize that his mate is far more knowledgeable than he in dinim, the laws of Shabbos, shemiras haloshon and is actually expert in chumash and the rest of nach, Pirkei Avos and the laws of prayer—inclusive. She is even well versed in Kitzur Shulchan Aruch, Sefer Mitzvos l’Rambam and has passed tests at a very high level. And he—he plugs away at his gemora between meals and tries to keep up with the intricacies of the sugya. And here comes the first crisis. If she isn’t clever enough to hide her knowledge but waves it in front of his face, or tries to raise his spiritual level, he will soon arrive at the conclusion that he has found himself a mashgiach for a wife.

In addition, she is the proverbial `eishes chayil’ who can cook, bake, shop, clean—and even support him! This puts her in the driver’s seat, the one who runs the show. He makes no decisions, yet has to justify his in-laws’ huge financial outlay. And so he continues learning, or rather, attending kollel.

When he meets his old friends from yeshiva, he has to play the role of super lucky, but is this true? Doesn’t he feel second rate when she buffers their joint account with her monthly salary (even before the wedding)? And how does he feel when she asks if he wants a check book altogether, since she is the one who does the shopping anyway?

It’s not the same story with everyone. Things usually run smoothly: she earns the money and spends it, since his kollel salary certainly doesn’t cover even the basic household expenses. Besides, when his small pittance goes into her bank account which soon becomes theirs, he doesn’t even know how to manage it while she is expert at deposits, withdrawals, savings, pension and other plans. These concepts are a foreign language to him and when the first Yom Tov comes along and he forgets to buy her flowers, she feels insulted.

At this point, I’d like to advise yeshiva students who smoke to stop immediately. Don’t keep up any such habit that costs money. How will you feel when you have to ask for pocket money from the lady of the house who brings in that money? I’m warning you that if you want to hold on to the title of `Torah scholar by profession’, that is, Toraso umnaso, for the coming years, you had better start changing your habits right now.

I see these fresh kollel students a year later, the very ones from my yeshiva shiur . . . The wife goes off to work at seven thirty, her face made up, dressed to the hilt in clothing she recently bought since the outfits from sheva brachos no longer fit. And he, the super-learner, is left behind, glassy-eyed, to change the crown prince or princess, dress him/her and deliver him to the babysitter. Then he goes off to kollel to rest for a few hours, physically and emotionally, to `sacrifice himself on the altar of Torah’, which is his ultimate desire.

If he is fortunate, when he returns home in the afternoon after having duly made his purchases at the grocery from a prepared list and picked up the baby from the babysitter, he climbs up the three flights with the whole lot—groceries, baby and carriage, eats a lunch prepared the day before, and sends his helpmate off for her afternoon nap. Now he can luxuriate in an hour of nachas from his offspring whom he has finally succeeded to rock to sleep, just when he has to leave for kollel. He quietly leaves the carriage in front of the bedroom door and marches off to kollel. No ride in the afternoon…

Again, several hours of peace and joy for his aching bones, when his eyelids droop in front of his gemora and his chavrusa’s scenario is much the same. Our elite fellow studies very seriously after an hour of rest and a cup of coffee, and when he arrives home in great spirits, his wife is already tired again from cooking, laundry and child care. So he gallantly offers to do the dishes.

He takes down the garbage on his way off to night seder. He will always remain a Torah scholar and will never miss the night seder—unless the alternative is to remain home and babysit so his wife can go off shopping with friends or attend a wedding.

During the night, they work in tandem, he changing the baby and she—feeding it. There is no doubt about who is going to get up to find the fallen pacifier and rock the crib. After all, she’s got to be fresh and rested for the following day at work.

I look at those elite fellows from amongst my friends, hear the sighs of these top young guys and arrive at my own conclusions.

That’s how I begin to formulate my own theory of what I want to be `when I grow up’ and how I want my married life to look like. I conjure up the image of the wife I will choose for myself—one who will be a helpmate, an eizer, and not knegdo—in opposition.

On the other hand:

I see my dear sister Tzippy who has been saving her pennies for the past five years and who never spent an unnecessary shekel from her babysitting earnings or months of salaries. She tries to help our father so that he won’t have to take out loans when the time comes.

My father is prepared for everything; all he wishes is to see his princesses getting married. At this stage, Tzippy has decided that she won’t be the one to say `No’, and will regard the next feasible suggestion in the most rosy light.

I’m not promising that I will totally ignore my warning system, and am even prepared to suggest someone who is older than her, someone from a family of baalei teshuva who is on a definite upward climb and is a serious, enthusiastic learner. I’ve been thinking about this for some time and believe that it would be compatible with her personally and ethically.

I’ve known Danny for many years. He became a baal teshuva on his own when he was 17: he got a taste of Yiddishkeit and got hung up on it. His parents were shocked; they never expected this but he managed to walk `between the raindrops’, doing his best not to antagonize them. He even agreed to go to the army and enroll in an officers’ training course. He served as a paramedic and signed up later for medical studies to appease them, while simultaneously not neglecting his Jewish studies, where he flourished. He is an excellent catch, a tremendous talmid chacham who works as a pediatrician in a Kupat Cholim branch in the city. He works and studies, a baal teshuva¸ a treasure of a fellow, but I’m afraid that my family will pelt me with their shoes if I dare suggest him. At worst, they’ll evict me from the house, bruised and battered, and I’ll have to seek medical treatment. I think I’ll go to him if I have to…

I’ve been trying to feel out the situation through a heart-to-heart talk with Tzippy and see what she thinks. I’ve begun telling her about Danny Golan, but the modern version of his last name puts her off. When she hears that he is a 33-year-old baal teshuva, no less, she looks at me very askance. I remind her of our decision to seriously consider every suggestion in the best possible light, and succeed in convincing her to agree to at least one date.

Only then do I approach my parents.

My mother is afraid it will stigmatize our family. If she weren’t’ my mother, I’d give her a five hour lecture on the hypocrisy of people who donate millions to the Teshuva movement and who are fed old wives’ tales that baalei teshuva stand on a far higher spiritual level than even perfect tzaddikim. For sure, they don’t stand in their place, because while baalei teshuva stand and study with fervor, the tzaddikim are sitting…

Out of parental respect, however, I keep my mouth shut and try to figure out a practical way of circumventing the deadlock. I’m not afraid of what people will say if Tzippy gets engaged to a baal teshuva; I am more afraid of my own conscience pangs if I fail to find her a husband who is a real tzaddik, someone of caliber. I would have chosen