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Wednesday, July 24, 2013

How I Met Serach, Part XVI: It's Shidduch Time!

This is Part XVI of a series about how I proposed to Serach. To see the series, you could simply use the guide link under the header of the blog or this link right here titled "How I Met Serach".
Ezzie's note:  In Part XIII, I explained the difficulty in writing this series. Some details may be a bit off; it's been a decade... 

Where we last left off, Serach and I were really getting pretty serious. One night when I was discussing it all with my "sister" B, she noted that of course, she had to meet Serach. And lo and behold, she was coming into New York soon to check out a college, and would probably be in town around Chanukah. We made up to go together to a concert (I believe it was Blue Fringe, Lanzbom & Solomon, and maybe the Solomon Brothers?) over Chanukah that Serach and I were going to, another friend ("Y") would be meeting us there, and B'd bring along her friend - let's call her B2.

For this story, we have to rewind even further back, to April 2002. I had recently switched dorm rooms at OJ, moving from the room of one good friend to another. The friend whose room I moved into was standing in the room one night, late at night, and I was on the phone with B. Suddenly, it clicked in my head: "B, I know who you're going to marry." 'Huh? Who?' "Don't worry, I know who. One day, I'll introduce you." After I got off the phone I told my roommate: "JB, I know who you're going to marry." He looked at me like I was crazy, shrugged, and that was that.

On this cold night in December 2003, I planned on sleeping at JB's dorm in YU, since it was a lot closer to where Serach would be staying in the Lander women's dorm on the Upper West Side. As it was getting close to time to go, I said to JB "Hey, why don't you come along? We can drive there (JB had a car), and you can hang out with us." 'Who will I talk to? You'll be talking to Serach the whole time.' "Yeah, but we'll still talk to you, and Y (who he knew) is coming, and there will be other people there. You'll have a great time." After a few minutes of back and forth, JB relented, and we drove to the concert.

At the concert (which as I recall was a bit of a snoozer), Y ended up running into another friend, and to my not surprise, JB hit it off with B and B2. At one point during the night, B comes over to me as Serach is schmoozing with JB and B2, smiled, and said "Ezzie, she's a keeper." For some reason, while before then I had already made up my mind, this put my mind completely at ease. I subconsciously needed B's approval, and now I had it. By the end of the night, they were fast friends; I, meanwhile, was just... calm. Happy.

At about midnight, we walked outside B.B. King's and were talking for a bit in the freezing cold when B said they'd be taking a subway back to Brooklyn to B2's relatives. I insisted that this was not safe, and that instead, JB should drive them. After a couple of minutes trying to convince them it wasn't safe for two beautiful young ladies who are not from NYC to be on the subway to Brooklyn alone at 1 o'clock in the morning, they relented, and JB drove them home. Meanwhile, I dropped Serach back at the LCW dorms and headed up to YU.

Right after I got back to YU, B called me. "Hello?" 'OMG Ezzie should I have given him my number!?!!?!' "...{sigh}...did you like him? [Note: Neither one knew this was who I thought they'd marry.]" 'Yes! He's so nice! I can't believe he drove us all the way home. Should I have given him my number so he can call me??' "...yeeesss..." 'AAAHHH!!! He's SO nice. I hope I didn't just blow my chance. I have to go.' Click. A few minutes later, JB walks back in, exhausted. He apparently had called Serach on the way home and told her "I really liked her, she's really cute." 'Which one, B2?' "No, B!" As soon as he came into his dorm room he says to me, "Should I have given her my number?" 'ARRGH! You BOTH stink!' I then explained that she'd just asked me the same question. I gave him her number, he called her right that minute to ask her out the next night, and they dated I think almost every night she was in town for the next week. A few months later, I reminded B about how I'd told her two or so years prior that I knew who she'd marry; "Oh yeah! Who was that?!" 'JB.' "WHAT?! Really!? That's crazy!" (The next year she wrote a piece in her college paper about it.)

...and that completes the story of How JB Met B, and finishes up Serach and Ezzie's dating, circa 2003. So we're still less than a decade removed...

Next time on How I Met Serach: Meet the Parents.

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