15 Jul
Beshert, Latest

Beshert | Inside Our Gates

Josh and I met in Jerusalem, just outside the Jaffa Gate. He was a tour guide before COVID-19 brought the tourist trade shuddering to a halt, but he still made some money giving tours to locals. I knew him remotely through a friend and saw a Facebook post offering a tour of the Old City, my favorite part of Jerusalem.  At 40, I had never been married and was no longer looking for love. “That ship has sailed,” I told myself. I also told myself, “I don’t mind.”  Of course I did mind, but what can you do? On my 40th birthday, I resolved to put all that behind me and to focus instead on enjoying my life. I was happy to take a day off work to learn more about my magnificent city. And there at...

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03 Sep
Beshert, Latest

Beshert | Crushing on Leonard Nimoy

It was 1970 and “Star Trek” had just ended on TV. Leonard Nimoy, who played Mr. Spock, the hybrid human-alien, had a young fan in the freshman girl who was a year behind me at our Chicago high school.  Mr. Nimoy was tall and thin. At 5’10”, so was I. He had a certain Eastern European countenance. My face displayed my Eastern European heritage. He had a Vulcan haircut. My dark hair was longish. At school, I was in a theater group that rehearsed in the auditorium and band room. One day that spring, the freshman girl walked into the band room (she played French horn and percussion in the school’s concert band) and noticed the boy at the piano who, to her, bore a striking resemblance to Leonard Nimoy. She thought, “I need to find out...

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02 Jul
Beshert, Latest

Beshert | “I Get It.”

I’ve always been super confident in most things but faltered when it came to dating and love. I was looking for ease and perfection. And, my celiac disease made me filter out those who didn't seem too understanding or comforting.  As I entered my thirties, I found myself truly happy. I was in the best shape of my life and broke free from the corporate world when I started my own business from an office in WeWork. Elan worked for the company across the hall. At first, we exchanged waves. Hellos became chats over mugs of coffee in the shared kitchen space. We discovered that we each had an Israeli parent, his mother and my father. Finally, after five weeks, he asked me out for drinks. I happily agreed. Our date lasted four hours. I was intrigued. Elan was...

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25 Jun
Beshert, Latest

Beshert | Finding My Own Kind

My Grandma Phyllis always told me to “Stick to your own kind” when it came to dating. But to her disappointment, I’d never dated another Jew. I had, however, dated other women. I figured that was a good way to follow Grandma’s advice – weren’t women my kind, too? In 2010, after finishing my Ph.D., I moved to Norwich, England, where I knew almost no one, for work. That’s when my long-distance girlfriend suddenly dumped me. Bereft, shocked and alone, I just stayed in my flat or went to work. I did a lot of crying. Then I went to lunch with a male friend, thinking I should get out of the house. I’d heard there was an afternoon tea party for lesbian and bisexual women later that day. My friend told me to go, to cheer...

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26 Mar
Beshert, Latest

Beshert | My Two Bundles of Meant-To-Be

I always wanted to be somebody’s mother. Since I was six, I would fantasize about holding my baby, dressing her and loving her.  I shared so much love and laughter with my own mother, Helen Ruset, that I wanted to have that with my baby. My dream baby was always a girl. We would have matching outfits, me and mini-me. So when I found myself divorced at 40 with no children, all I could think was, “This is not my plan.”  I began my quest for Mr Right. I looked online, went on singles trips, and allowed myself to be fixed up. I never found him. Clearly, the universe had him going in a different direction. After six years of looking for him, I decided to adopt a baby. I had a successful home-based business and a four-bedroom house....

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13 Feb
Beshert, Latest

Beshert | The Song of Our Lives

Then I saw her. Across the crowded room. Dancing alone in a red dress. It wasn’t just her beauty. It was a spirit emanating from her being. I approached her and we talked a bit. I found out her name was Rusti. Enchanting. But she was swarmed by other boys—she was beautiful, talented and smart.

Nevertheless, when I returned to my fraternity house that night, I told my brothers that I would marry her. It was love at first sight. 

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06 Feb
Beshert, Latest

Beshert | Once Upon a Time in Montevideo…

I met my husband in a hotel lobby in Montevideo, Uruguay on my 27th birthday. We were browsing the lobby stores because the hotel’s only elevator was broken. We hailed from different continents and were both on delayed business trips, which made meeting on yet another continent beshert. He thought I was a local girl from Uruguay and I thought he, a European businessman, was attractive with an accent. By the time they fixed the elevator, we had invited each other for dinner. Work friends were taking me out for my birthday; when they picked me up, they were surprised at my speed in rounding out the dinner party.  At a restaurant on the Rio Plata, bordering Argentina, we spoke a mix of languages made fluent by champagne. He claimed he spoke English and that my Spanish...

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