Meeting My Future Wife
A fortuitous happening during my first year at Sinai was the arrival of my future wife, Joanne. She came to Florida with her two-year-old son, Ron, to attend the Bat Mitzvah of Viki, the daughter of her cousin Sandy and Marvin. As the saying goes, “She came and never left.”
Sandy and Marvin felt that it was time to meet the new cantor who was training their daughter, Viki, for Bat Mitzvah. Sandy invited me for dinner at their home, and I met Joanne.
In my entire professional life, I never dated a congregant. Joanne was clearly the exception to this rule. Recently divorced, she was in her twenties and very attractive, enough to make eyes turn in her direction. My eyes not only turned to her direction but remained fixed there.
I was very attracted to her, she seemed quite special, and I asked her out the following day. It was the beginning of our very beautiful relationship together.
Joanne loved being in Florida and took a position as a lab technician and decided to join the temple. She was interviewed by two men from the admissions committee, Frank Kromsky and Joe Peiken. They were so taken with her that they ran her through the admission procedure in less than two minutes, a definite departure from the norm. They welcomed her with open arms to Temple Sinai. They also mentioned that she would be a great asset to the choir.
My relationship with Joanne flourished. There was a strong mutual attraction, and we were in a beautiful courtship. We saw each other often and dined in restaurants from Miami to Fort Lauderdale.
At the Jackie Gleason cantorial concert, I made sure that Joanne was seated in the first-row center. We enjoyed the concerts at the philharmonic and the opera in Fort Lauderdale. Why then, I wondered, did I proceed slowly in getting married? Why did I wait before I leaped?
When I was living in Manhattan, my close friends were marrying and divorcing with alarming frequency. It is no wonder that I was a bit fearful of tying the knot. The last incident in New York involved one of my friends, Lou, who was married to a teacher who taught French in high school. After two years of marriage, she accidentally shot him in the foot. Some of us felt that she was really aiming for his heart and missed. We’ll never know. They divorced shortly thereafter.
The idea of getting married and putting my state of bachelorhood to a rest was truly a giant leap forward. Everything fell into place perfectly with Joanne at my side. Finally, that special moment came to me. I realized that Joanne had it all, and she felt the same way about me. We were in love. One night before choir, getting down on one knee, I asked Joanne to be my wife. When she answered “Yes!” I felt like the happiest man in the world, fully ready for the joy of a Wednesday evening choir rehearsal.
