by Leora Klein.(edited by Alix Strauss)
Dan sounded great on paper: Upper East Side, Fieldston, Brown undergrad, NYU Law, formerly a corporate lawyer, currently a CEO of a nonprofit that seeks to foster peace between Palestinian and Israeli children…My mother met his mother at a charity dinner. Seated next to each other, nibbling on raisin nut rolls, patiently waiting for their salad plates to be whisked away, they noticed that neither woman ate the shaved fennel. By the time the blackened sea bass was served they were dear friends. She didn’t wait for dessert to show my mother a photograph of her son, and my mother called me from the car on her way home to tell me the great news.
“She had a photograph of her son in her evening bag?”
“Actually, she had it on her cell phone, and he looked very handsome with a nice head of hair.”
“Did you inquire about his height?” I am 5’9″.
“I did and she said he was taller than her husband, and her husband was tall.”
He sounded too perfect. My mother always taught me perfect doesn’t exist.