Out of Town is NOT Outer Space--part #3
I'd like to specifically concentrate for a minute on out of town as it relates to shidduchim. What are some of the main reasons why New Yorkers hesitate to date a man or woman from out of town? What keeps them from making out of town shidduchim? I've been making notes of some of the reasons given to me. Here is what parents have told me over the years.
1. When will I ever see my grandchildren? I want my daughter/son close by.
2. What will they do if they need help and I am here and they are there?
3. Do you know how much all the plane tickets to get them back to New York for all the holidays and special occasions will cost me?
4. Why should brothers and sisters be separated just when they are adults and could enjoy each other's company?
5. Why should they live where the machatonim live? Why are we less choshuv as parents?
6. They have close friends here. Who will they know if they move out of town?
7. I am not going to be reduced to a "check sender." If I am paying they will live near me.
8. How do I know the machatonim will treat him/her right? I need them where I can see them.
9. I've been to__________and I didn't like it. Why should I send my child there?
10. My child is used to a certain level of frumkeit that just isn't available outside of New York.
11. They are going to have to send their kids to school here in New York anyway so why live out of town?
12. My child has never so much as had to balance a checkbook and you want me to send him/her out of town and away from my help?
13. What's the matter, there aren't enough boys/girls here in New York? Why do I need out of town?
14. Out of town communities are too cliquey. What if my child doesn't fit in?
15. There aren't enough opportunities out of town.
16. Sure, the kids may enjoy it now, but who will their kids have to marry?
17. My child is too young to cope with out of town.
18. My child is too young to be that far away from us.
19. What will my friends/neighbors/family say if my child moves to_______________?
20. We're frummer then out of towners. Why should my child have to settle for less?
21. If the family is so frum why are they living out of town?
22. I have no one reliable to check with about the family.
23. Even if the couple lives here in New York, how will the girl/boy fit in to what is really a very different society then what they are used to?
24. Out of towners have really peculiar notions about yiddishkeit.
25. My child has been brought up very differently then this other person's upbringing and they won't mesh comfortably.
26. Out of towners are too relaxed--they don't understand the rules.
27. Out of town is only when you are getting desperate.
28. They better have a lot of money if you are asking me to give up my child to out of town.
29. Aren't most out of towners baalei teshuvah?
30. My parents/grandparents did not take all the trouble to leave Europe and come to New York for me to send my child away now.
31. I might consider the boy/girl but only if it is understood they will live in New York near us.
32. Out of town? No thanks. They are all free thinkers.
33. Too much gashmius and not enough ruchnius out of town.
34. There is only one shule in this place he/she comes from? What kind of frum place has only one shule?
35. I can understand why he/she would want to marry a New Yorker and come here, but why should we want an out of towner?
36. New York is the cultural center of the US. What can out of town offer?
And one of my all time favorites: "Out of town women don't know how to dress. I'm just not up to having to train a stranger."
You think the statements above are the exceptions rather than the rule? Wrong. New Yorkers tend to be very insular, starting with the very frum to the right and moving all the way to the left. It is not only the degree and level of frumkeit that is involved here; every level seems to have a bias against out of town.
I will allow that a few of the statements are concerns that parents might legitimately have. It's hard, for instance, when grandchildren live very far away. (And these are the same grandparents, many of them, who will be moving part-time or full time to Florida or Israel when they retire, but that is different right?) But as to the rest, are shidduchim, for boys or for girls, really so plentiful, covering the ground like apples fallen from a tree? Funny, I hadn't noticed that. And as for some of the statements, careful New Yorkers, your "gaivoh" is showing. Just a note: if I sound that little bit snippy about New Yorkers, I AM an out of towner living here and I have been on the receiving end of some of those comments on a personal basis.
Yes, there may sometimes be parnoseh or studying issues that require someone to be in a particular place, at least for a limited amount of time. If so, then that becomes an element of a shidduch. But please, someone show me where it says that your zivug is going to be within a square mile of where you are living? I do vaguely recollect that our Avos and Imahos all made "out of town" shidduchim, and the results seemed just fine.
I wonder just how many people we have who are single because they refused an out of town shidduch, a shidduch that was the "right" one?
And just a parting thought regarding # 17 and #18 above. If a child is too young to cope with out of town or to be away from his/her parents, shouldn't we be just that tiniest bit worried that they just might not be ready to get married period?
I can just envision a scene up in shomayim between the Ribboneh Shel Olam and a malach. Hashem has just paired up two people and the malach respectfully tells Him that he doesn't think the shidduch will work because one of the parties is going to be living out of town when the time comes for a shidduch. Are people really so self-centered that they think that Hashem is mezaveg zevugim by zip code?
6 comments:
[sigh]
To sum your list up: New Yorkers (or at least, the vast majority of them) are snobs.
Tell me something I didn't know. All the more reason not to marry one if I can help it. :-P
Scraps,
The last person I remember saying I'm not marrying a New Yorker married someone from Williamsburg. Never say never.
Unfortunately, there are out-of-towners who buy into the myth too. At least, the last one I dated, hoping for a less narrow viewpoint, was an honorary citizen of Flatbush who believed everything you've just posted as erroneous Bklyn-think.
Considering that my hashkafot and religious practices are nowhere near Chassidishe levels, I doubt that my future husband is to be found in Willy. But you're right, you never know.
I never said that I turn down New Yorkers, just that I don't want to marry a snobby one. There are some New Yorkers who aren't snobby, after all.
I am really disturbed by your anti-New York fascism. Yes, there are people in New York who think that way, but it’s not all of us. You know what I really don’t like? The smug, superior attitude of out-of-towners who think that they’re so much better than New Yorkers because they can think out of the box and they aren’t a cookie cutter.
We’re not all like your stereotype, and it’s shameful that you’re making it seem like we are.
Your anti-New York attitude is no better, more mature, or sensible than our anti-Out-of-Towner attitude.
lynette,
Were I truly a fascist, by definition I would not have published your comment. Let's let the dictionary be the final authority here: 1. (sometimes initial capital letter) a governmental system led by a dictator having complete power, forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism, regimenting all industry, commerce, etc., and emphasizing an aggressive nationalism and often racism.
2. (sometimes initial capital letter) the philosophy, principles, or methods of fascism.
3. A system of government marked by centralization of authority under Oppressive, dictatorial control.
Since New York is still a part of the US and since New Yorkers are not "a race apart" I can hardly be accused of aggressive nationalism or racism. Nor can I be accused of "forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism," as I very openly ask readers here to comment, and I publish what they say, bar any comments that use 4-letter words in lieu of English.
"We’re not all like your stereotype." But your statement admits that there are indeed New Yorkers who are exactly like my statement.
"Your anti-New York attitude is no better, more mature, or sensible than our anti-Out-of-Towner attitude." I never claimed that it was. But antipathy usually arises in response to a stimulus. Think of it as cause and affect. Were the general run of New Yorkers less antipathetic to out of towners, the response of out of towners would be measurably more sedate.
In this Jewish New Yorkers are no different then non-Jewish New Yorkers. They self-proclaim New York as "the Big Apple." Pardon me if I point out that there are some worms embedded in that apple.
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