Group therapy in a blog.
Esther Kustanowitz
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Posts by Esther Kustanowitz
Refraction
919 years
It’s hard to come back from it, the edge of whatever your hope once was, to overcome the impetus that made you lose your footing and dangle from precipices to begin with. Harder still because you put yourself there, in some misguided, self-affirmative step toward individuation. Grimacing through the pain of it all, your mantra: all for the best, all for the best. Words ring empty–if at all–when vocalized, but still, must be repeated for continuity’s sake, must be repeated ad infinitum, must be repeated until you start to believe it.
You stay active in body and mind, so the totality of you will persevere, past bumps in the road and rough patches and stormy seas and a thousand other cliches. Slowly, you claw your way back, because you want to or because you have to. You seek redefinition of what you’d perceived, and recontextualize yourself within the new construct.
Although you’ve swept them up before, shards of shattered hopes remain, insidious, piercing your bare feet just when you thought you’d found them all. But you’re tough. Callused, in protection from renegade vestiges of something you thought was possible.
In daily life, you cultivate steeliness, deny your warmth and flexibility. You’re still you, craving the clamor of contact, the intensity of perceived or actual intimacy. But it’s safer here. There’s no room for interpretation in metals and no heartbreak in stone.
It’s only temporary. You know it is. As if there were an expiration date on sadness. You feel it in the air like pollen, an irritant that heralds the spring thaw. You rotate, earthlike, on your axis, yet not feeling like the world does or should revolve around you. But the motion is constant, and constitutes progress.
There are others now, refracting prismatically, sometimes dazzlingly shiny. Shielding your eyes, you wonder if you’ll ever see inside, and if the interior is as opulent as the exterior seems. But at least it’s something new to look at.
The Week in Dating
519 years
What week in dating? I know it’s only Monday. But start the week with last Monday if it makes more sense to you.
If you’ve been thinking about calling E-Cyrano to help you with your profile, now’s the time to help yourself and me at the same time. First, go here and decide which package is for you. Then, on the “buy†page, you’ll see that they’ve added an option to “How did you hear about E-Cyranoâ€Â, that says “E-Cyrano consultantâ€Â. If you do that, the page will refresh and you can type in my first name (“ESTHER”), so I can get “credit†for the referral and the client will be assigned to me. (Tell your friends! Thank you!)
First, we’ll visit with the regular gals and see what they’re up to:
Hilary had the blahs before the weekend, but her mood was much improved after a well-deserved few days away. Annabel Lee is up to date #3 with an E who (just to clarify) is not me and whose manners are devolving more and more with every date (unfortunately). That guy who usurped my initial better step up, or I am reporting him to the Committee on “E” Abuse. And Ari strikes again, by giving us just enough to keep us curious, but it seems fairly clear that she both kissed a new boy and saw a celebrity. I think if those things both happened to me on the same night, I’d probably die of shock right there.
I haven’t linked to the Smitten in a while, because she’s become a Bridezilla. Just kidding. She just wants it the way she wants it. But since she met her fiance via the wonderful world of blogging, I thought she was worth including as a role model. Plus, chiquita (and her man, the chico) totally rocked Weight Watchers into oblivion. (If only that kind of success were contagious…)
Barefoot Jewess, whose blog I don’t visit nearly often enough, muses as to “how Jewish” she needs a life-partner to be.
Here’s a new blog, found via Superjux, wherein the author reflects on all of her first dates. Even for first dates, my blog on the same topic would be extremely short, and not very interesting. Just like most of my first dates.
Over at Jewlicious, Laya posted about JQS Corp, which runs JMatch and is trying to give JDate a run for their money. They have a really cool blog, which features content from Jewlicious (including some posts by yours truly), and now have regular text-based instant chat as well as voice and video chat. Since we’re plugging sites here, some of you internet-inclined Jewish daters may also wish to try the free-to-register JSoul, which is run by a friend of mine. Feel free to write them or me with your feedback…
And of course, in case you haven’t been paying attention (please present palms, as I smack them with a ruler), Dr. Janice relaunched her site. Check her out, sign up for her newsletter etc. After all, as she stated in an earlier comment, she’s “here to help!”
Have you ever wondered why people can be such jerks when it comes to dating, finally, we have the answer: it’s all our celebrities fault. According to this article, our celebrities are pretty poor role models when it comes to relationships. I mean, how often has it happened to us that our boyfriends leave us for Angelina Jolie? And what’s their excuse? “Brad Pitt did it…” In the world of this article, Sienna Miller=all that is good and Hillary Clinton and Victoria Beckham=women who accept their husbands’ philanderings without standing up for themselves. Well, an interesting theory.
You know what else is interesting? The concept of an Israeli version of the Bachelor, but starring an American guy from NYC. Esther at Jewlicious (I always enjoy her writing) shares her impressions of yet another Israeli reality show she’ll never get to see, this one starring a guy who looks not entirely unlike David Boreanaz, which is never a bad thing (and shout-out to Jason for that call).
And in a note only slightly related to dating, my friend Mark is one of the writers featured in Situation: Comedy, the new Project-Greenlight-style reality series on Bravo where the end product is a sitcom. (How’s that related to dating? Last year, Mark, a friend of mine from camp who’s been living in LA, married Mindy, another friend of mine who was living in New York. They didn’t meet through me, but they could have, which proves a) that long-distance relationships can work if the people want them to, and b) that if everyone hangs out with me enough, you’ll probably all end up married.) Watch the show (Tuesdays at 8, I believe), go to his site, leave him messages of support, link to him from your blogs, and tell him Esther sent you…
That’s all for now. Date well and wisely, and feel free to share the best and the worst with me. Like Dr. Janice, I’m here to help!
Dr. Janice’s Site Relaunched
319 years
Friend of JDA Dr. Janice has relaunched her site. Now the celebrated Love Coach has a shiny new site, and a URL that’s super-easy to remember: doctorlovecoach.com.
Go visit her, sign up for her newsletter and register so you can participate in discussions on the message boards. You just might learn something!
And do tell her that Esther, Queen of JDaters Anonymous, and She Who Kvetches Urbanely As Well As Jewliciously, sent you…
More Adventures in Billboard Dating…
819 years
He’s 31 and still single? Whatever shall we do? We must rescue him from this horrible fate of loneliness…let’s get ourselves a billboard! Stat! And we’ll fill it with clever verbiage!
“I’m Lance, Let’s go out!” reads the billboard on an interstate near Lindon, about 40 miles south of Salt Lake City.
Given, it’s in Utah, so maybe NYC’s big advertising firms are too busy to provide this guy with slogans, but still…
…So why the concern over Archibald’s marital status? As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, whose members typically marry in their early 20s, the 31-year-Archibald is approaching the male-equivalent of an “old maid.”
There’s a male equivalent of an old maid? I love it. Finally, some equity.
But how does Archie feel about the attention? Is he excited by his friends’ efforts? Mortified by the publicity? Or completely and utterly the Mormon equivalent of pareve on the matter?
“I’m not overly concerned about (marriage). I’m pretty happy right now,” Archibald said. “I’d like to get married, but it’s not a concern.”
He seems pretty “laid-back and easy-going.” I bet he also likes to work hard and play hard. Maybe he should try JDate? Nah, he’s “not overly concerned.” In the big city, we like to call that “not overly interested in commitment.” Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I’m just sayin’, like the old adage goes, if’n you’re not looking to meet someone, don’t put up a billboard.
Plea for Help: Liver Transplant Needed
019 years
This is not a joke. This is not a hoax. This is a real person, a 31-year-old woman from Long Island, who is engaged to be married in October, and who led a 345-city tour to raise awareness of the importance of blood donation, whose liver suddenly failed this week, and who needs a complete liver transplant (Type A or O) to survive.
There are very few of us who might be able to help in finding a liver. But if you know someone who can help, contact liverforalife@yahoo.com or go to http://helpshari.typepad.com. Link to the blog, send emails to your friends, send notes of support to her friends and family (via the blog)–do whatever you can.
And if nothing else, pray.
“My Big Fake Jewish Wedding”
219 years
Weddings are supposed to be about joy and harmony, but the reality is, uniting two families is a complex negotiation, a diplomatic and tenuous situation, and rife with the opportunity for drama, comedy, and if you’re lucky, a good spot at the smorgasbord.
For instance, take Leah Lowenstein’s wedding to Sam Levine. Leah’s a nice Bais Yaakov girl from a religious family; Sam’s in a rock band. Sam’s mother, Dr. Roz, has a popular radio advice show, but she has an awful relationship with Sam’s father, Morty. Dr. Roz has hired her “hippie rabbi,†Conrad Singer, to perform the wedding, unbeknownst to the Lowensteins, who have employed Rabbi Perl, a more traditionally Orthodox rabbi. The dysfunction flows like Baron Herzog into the glass of hyperactive, almost too-happy bridesmaid, Gitti Sara, who’s so desperate to get married that she solicits dates from the guests. Most of them just ignore the histrionics, turning their attentions to the kosher Moroccan-style buffet.
Maybe you need a Jewish wedding refresher course. Or you’re sick of attending weddings. Or you’re considering a career as an Owen Wilson/Vince Vaughn-style wedding crasher. “A Match Made in Manhattan†is a chance to attend nuptials where no one cares how you behave  as long as you participate in the simcha, and play Jewish geography until you find someone you know. (Like I did.)
For more of this week’s column, “My Big Fake Jewish Wedding,” click here.
Putting the “Desperate” Back in “Desperately Seeking…”
019 years
[Originally posted at Jewlicious]
Who doesn’t love Jewish singles events? (I know, stretching the sarcasm until it transforms into a rhetorical question.)
The Transom (which is apparently a section of the NY Observer) went to a Jewish singles night at the Upper West Side’s Makor (Steinhardt Center of the 92nd Street Y).
They interviewed Dave/Steve/Mike/Mark Jacob Manczyk (the names will change from event to event, but believe me, the issues remain the same), who spent the evening apparently either joking/flirting with the reporter or stumbling over his own words. (As you can see, sometimes it’s hard to tell which…) Here’s Manczyk on matchmaking:
“It’s an act of desperation, it’s unnatural. I wouldn’t want to tell my kids I met their mom through a matchmaker.†But the single-meet up scene hasn’t done the trick either, right? “Maybe it’s me, maybe I’m the one with the problem, the relationship issue. Maybe I’m the fool.†He looked up, eyes bright. “How old are you? Could you take off your glasses?â€Â
Michelle Lee, a 33-year old lawyer, is a JDate member and regular single event attendee. How has the matchmaking been going, the Transom asks. “I’m still single,†she sang. And the JDate, the singles events? “I’m still single,†she repeated.
She sang? I’ve attended many an event, and have never “sung” anything resembling “I’m single”–there’s a karaoke event that might have seen a rendition of “I’m Too Sexy,” but even that cannot be corroborated. I guess she’s the one who puts the “sing” back in single.
The man she’s with, Dave Sanders, 39, is an engineer from Queens. He answers for what she’s looking for in a man. “You know, someone blond, blue eyes, likes to ski and travel,†he said. The Transom cringed as he described himself, but Ms. Lee giggled.
I’m still kind of cringing. But look, she found it entertaining enough that they’re talking of margaritas for next week. So good luck to these crazy kids. Here’s hoping they make it through and never have to attend any other Jewish singles events ever, me’az v’ad olam…IYH soon too by you, amen selah.
Jewish Singles Events: Putting the “Desperate” Back in “Desperately Seeking…” Since Before the Common Era…
For Everyone Who Describes Themselves as “Ripped”
219 years
Adonises and Adonisettes of the world, be sure to warm up, stretching all of the major muscle groups, jog over to the computer that’s mounted over your treadmill, set the incline at 8.5 and the speed at 15 mph, and log on Fitness Singles, the site for people as obsessed with fitness as you are.
That’s right, now you can find someone who is as in love with his or her own body as you are with yours! Finally, the person to whom you can say, “honey, do these washboard abs make me look fat?”
Follow online dating registration with a rigorous circuit training workout, ending in three reps of 8-Minute Abs, and followed by a cool-down.
Singles Columnist to Hire Husband
419 years
Hey, you thought that was about me, didn’t you? Well, I never. Literally. I would never seek to “hire” a husband, because I can’t afford a good one, and what’s the point in engaging the services of a sub-par husband? I mean, really…
Palm Beach (Florida) singles columnist Angela Manfredi (who’s apparently looking for her own Man Freddy, or Mikey, or Davey, or whoever) has given up on looking for love and decided to take on some help of the husband variety: someone who can take out the trash, fix things around the house, presumably open jars…you know, husband things. And she’s chronicling the journey for her column in the Palm Beach Post.
The term of engagement for such an indispensable “husband”? Two weeks. Payment? “To be discussed privately, but not less than $1000.” (See more details and legal stuff at the “apply” section of her site.)
In her own words:
Help Wanted: Unique position available for success-minded single man to help never-wed singles columnist experience the practical side of marriage for two weeks over the summer.
Responsibilities include: Rescuing me from the perils of intrusive dinner party conversation, car concerns, household handiwork and hurricane preparations. Applicants should be proficient at displaying enthusiasm and rapt attention while listening to a vivid, detailed account of my entire day.
The ideal candidate: He possesses the ability to express (in a gentle, flattering, non-verbal way) that the outfit I’m eyeing is better suited for one of Lil’ Kim’s back-up dancers.
What’s in it for him? For better or worse, until the end of our employment contract do us part, you could consider this espousal exercise groom-ing for the real thing, a refresher course, or just a great summer job opportunity!
Angela’s never been married and claims “22 years” in the dating trenches. And yet she looks like a daytime TV talk show host. Maybe she’s living in the wrong city? I dunno.
Anyone who wants to try on husband shoes for a few weeks?
And any suggestions for stunts I should pitch to the Jewish Week for my column?
JDate’s Literal Poster Girl
319 years
The glamorous showbiz lifestyle has finally got its dirty mitts on the previously innocent Annabel Lee, luring her with corporate promises of beauty, billboard prominence and tank tops.
Back in June (the post is from my birthday, which I attribute to that day’s intrinsic glamour and luck), the divine Miss L received an email from evil corporate bastion of internet dating JDate that her picture had caught their collective eye. They extended seductive promises: you’ll not only enjoy a fun day with fellow JDate Members and the chance to be featured in our campaigns, but you’ll also receive a $200 cash bonus and digital copies of your best looking headshots. You’ll have great photos for your profile and to send to family and friends! Unfortunately, we cannot provide compensation for travel arrangements or other expenses, but in addition to offering you this exciting opportunity, we’ll treat you to a delicious breakfast and lunch, and of course, some glamorous socializing.
Turns out, they had her at hello. Our girl enlisted for her day of “glamourous socializing” with other unsuspecting, L.A.-area JDaters who had also been caught in their taloned claws, much like King Kong did Fay Wray/Jessica Lange/Naomi Watts. You can read about her day here.