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Esther Kustanowitz
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Posts by Esther Kustanowitz
Happy Tu B’Av: Jewish Holiday of Love (If You’re Lucky)
116 years
As happens in the Jewish calendar, last night began a holiday that continues today: Tu B’Av, the traditional Jewish holiday of love. The timing is designed so that after Tish’ah B’Av, the Ninth of Av fast day, which recalls the tragedies of the Jewish people especially the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, we affirm life with joy, celebration and looking toward a future (read: the hope of future Jewish babies).
I was supposed to go to the Bangitout Tu B’Av party in NYC–which draws about 800-1000 Jews all (theoretically) looking for relationships. If I still had the Jewish Week singles column, I would have gone for research, but since Jewish singles isn’t my official pring beat anymore, this year, I was going just for me. But it wasn’t in the cards. (Read why here.)
Because last week was Tish’ah B’Av, this Shabbat is Shabbat Nachamu, the “Shabbat of Consolation” on which Madonna will be justifying her love with her husband through renewal of vows, and which traditionally has served as a designated Jewish singles weekend for the eternally hopeful.
But singles weekends are expensive, so many will take a less costly route and gather in Central Park on Shabbat for picnicking and kibbitzing. Who knows? I might even be there.
And now, a Tu B’Av video courtesy of some of my blog friends, including Benji Lovitt of WhatWarZone. Happy Tu B’Av!
“Marriage on Their Minds”…But Is It? I Mean, Really?
716 years
Like many long-time single Jewish Upper West Siders, I read “Marriage on Their Minds,” by former editrix of Heeb Jennifer Bleyer, with great interest, and admittedly, some jealousy. The color green (jealousy) comes courtesy of the writer in me, who’s always been jealous of the category known as “people I moderately know who are suddenly writing about Jewish single life in the NY Times instead of me.” And the interest, of course, comes from what seems a sudden interest in the social lives of UWS Jews -an area I’ve had some interest in for some time – from the Grey Lady.
The piece is a basic intro for those not familiar with “the scene,” and a trip down memory lane for those of us who, at any point in our lives, lived it. To sum up: lots of singles in NYC, lots of Jews, Lincoln Square, Jewish Center, Bangitout and their annual Tu B’Av festivus (scheduled for this Thursday in NYC), “not in the shtetl anymore,” singles with marriage on their minds (on paper, at least) but who never have to grow up. To sum up even further: News Alert–Jewish Singles Found on Upper West Side: Who Knew?.
“Friends With Benefits”: A Commentary on Modern Love?
616 years
Of all the JDaters Anonymous posts I’ve written, the one that keeps getting found (and commented on) is the one I wrote in early 2006, right before I boarded a singles cruise to the Caribbean. (Perhaps I was subconsciously hoping I’d find someone on the boat…)
“Friends With Benefits” (imported from the days when I was still over at Blogger–see here for an additional nine comments that don’t appear on this site), remains a fascinating concept because it’s not about random sexual encounters with strangers…in an age when we’re looking for love and companionship, and as many say, “a best friend I can go through life with,” people find friendship and friskiness in the same person. They’re attracted to the personality, and to the sexual animal, and yet, don’t want to have a relationship with them.
Forget the people who don’t want to be in a relationship, period, with anyone. Commitment-phobes are also out. And habitual users of the drug known as casual sex or one-night stands aren’t what we’re talking about here. But people who are actively dating, involved in the process and the quest for someone to build a life with, and regularly sleeping with someone else whom they care about and whose company they enjoy? Why not try a relationship with such a person? Isn’t that what they’re looking for, someone they care for and attracted to? I mean look…we’ve all seen the episodes of “Friends”: it was FWB first for Monica and Chandler (and a lot of alcohol), and then they fell. Is that what people are subconsciously looking for when they enter a FWB situation, that it will progress beyond the defined limits into something more meaningful?
This topic continues to fascinate me, and I’m particularly interested, as always, in how this phenomenons exists (or doesn’t) in the Jewish world. But in a larger sense, what does this kind of arrangement mean about modern love? Does this emerge from a culture of infinite personalization? Since we can tailor our computer desktops and programs by going to the “Options” menu, do we expect to do the same thing with our love lives?
Do we feel empowered by the freedoms of the “Sex and the City” generation, and feel like we should be pursuing sex first, relationships later? And are people in FWB scenarios, who are still theoretically “looking for the one,” just fooling themselves and their non-FWB dates?
What other comments does the popularity of “Friends With Benefits” make on modern love??
Meet Me at Shul
716 years
It’s been said (or rather, sung) that what the world needs now is love, sweet love. It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of.
But you know what the world really needs? More Jewish dating sites!!!
Here’s MeetMeAtShul, which, in addition to being another free Jewish dating site, has the added benefit of a URL that can be read two ways–“Meet Me At Shul” or “Meet Meat Shul.” (If I founded it, would you go to the MeetMeat Shul? And what would they serve at kiddush? Just curious.)
Love, Jerusalem Style
016 years
Those of you hoping that this is a report from the Holy City about my impending marriage to an officer in the IDF are about to be disappointed. But those of you who might have missed my columns in the Jewish Week might be interested in this piece I did for the same newspaper about the new TV show “Serugim,” which chronicles single life in some of Jerusalem’s neighborhoods.
Love, Jerusalem Style
by Esther D. Kustanowitz
[…] residents have embraced the new show, which is in Hebrew, and tackles the experiences of single religious Jews from varying backgrounds.
The first two episodes deal with tensions within Orthodoxy and the nuances of interpersonal relationships between people who are very different, in terms of both personality and Jewish observance. For instance, women roommates have rules about men not sleeping over. But what if your date gets so drunk that he can’t drive home? Can he stay over? And what happens when that guy wants to put on tefillin in the morning, and the only set available is from Stacy, the Reform rabbinical student down the hall? […]
Revisiting JSinglesSpace and the Continuity Cafe
316 years
The piece below originally appeared as part of the Jewish Week’s “Big Ideas” Issue in December of 2006 and decried a lack of research on Jewish singles and suggested a center for research of single life which could double as a young community center and living space for single Jews.
Very recently, researcher Steven M Cohen produced “Uncoupled: How Our Singles are Reshaping Jewish Engagement,” a study about unmarried 20-somethings and 30-somethings and their habits regarding connection to Jewish life. (He’s speaking at the PresenTense Institute this Thursday at 1pm, and I’ve been invited to comment in response. See here for directions.)
But the more I think about it and write about it (on JDatersAnonymous and in the creation of a book proposal on the subject of Jewish singles), and the more I see of the communal approach of the PresenTense Institute, the more relevant I think a proposal like this is–people have their own projects and interests, but the spirit of the collective inspires individuals and their creativity. While this piece was written for the Jewish Week and therefore centered on New York City, the truth is that such an institute could exist in another major city somewhere–Chicago, LA, San Francisco or Jerusalem–and would yield interesting research as well as perhaps some interesting friendships and relationships.
So here’s the piece again for your re-consideration. Looking forward to the discussion. (And yes, the piece is available for reprints–reasonable rates, just ask.)
JSinglesSpace and the Continuity Cafe
by Esther D. Kustanowitz
Each year, a new crop of idealistic Jewish twentysomethings moves to New York City in an attempt to forge romantic futures and financial fortunes in the city that never sleeps. The number of people crammed into Upper West Side two-bedroom apartments that were converted to three to accommodate each year’s immigrant singles thematically recalls Lower East Side tenement days. 10024 has so many single Jewish women that they may not even all show up in a JDate zip code search (a true story from JDate customer service). And many of those twentysomethings stay uncoupled until they’re thirtysomething or fortysomething, clustering in tribes of the seemingly-eternally single. But despite all of these fascinating trends, academic studies have yet to focus on Jewish singles anywhere, let alone within the borders of New York City.
(more…)
What JDate Needs is a Digital Culture Evangelist
916 years
In this excellent, sure-to-become-a-classic post, Leah Jones enumerates a helpful list of “How Social Media Ruined Jdate For Me,” which is less a complaint and more a series of observations about how JDate isn’t living up to the technical expectations of a generation that lives increasingly online, and which increasingly requires more advanced features in order to surf and connect effectively.
If Jdate is monitoring any of the blogbuzz about their product and if they care about creating a system that works better (two assumptions, I know), hopefully they’ll take this free advice from someone who could actually fetch a high price for this kind of corporate technology assessment. But we’ll see.
Should In-Laws Have a Say? And Does How You Worship Matter?
216 years
I recently wrote this post over at Beliefnet’s Idol Chatter, and was surprised that the only comment it received noted that Isla Fisher should run away from her relationship because her in-laws wanted her to convert before her marriage to Sacha Baron Cohen. The commenter noted that even though she and her husband have different ideas about God, that “nobody should tell you how to worship.”
Is that what’s going on? Thoughts?
“Driving the Jewish Men Away”
11216 years
Remember this post, about “Open Space: That Question Again”? Good times. Now there’s a comment that requires your comments. So try to come at it with an open mind…
“With American Jewish men brought up from the earliest age to pair up with Jewish women and still so many choose non Jewish mates perhaps Jewish women must reflect on what they might be doing to drive these men away.”
For one, I know that my sense of humor is intimidating to men and women alike. So I’m going to try to be less entertaining from now on. It will be an effort, but I’ll do it for the birthrate.
What else can we Jewish women do to not scare Jewish men away? And while we’re making concessions, should Jewish men give us anything in return?
Canyon
016 years
In the space between spaces, the gaps that require bridges, there is an oppressive silence where loss reverberates–an echo, a ripple, a vast filling of a canyon with something unexpected and not altogether unpainful.
The canyon is a river, the river is a process that carries us through whether or not we want it to, the flow of water, blood or thought continues involuntarily until it stops, which isn’t a good thing either.
But flow is flow, and unbidden it begins or ends or continues, and the quiet restores, repairs, even as it provides additional spaces between spaces, gaps requiring bridges, and other canyons and rivers.
You find yourself wondering whose process this is, and whose space of silence.
Sometimes you care, and sometimes you don’t. But you always wonder.
[June 18, 2008-Jerusalem]