When a father realizes that his daughter is on her way to becoming a kallah, the normal reaction is to be delighted — especially when that daughter is 26 years old.

When my two older daughters told me they were ready to get engaged, I was thrilled. As could be expected, I experienced a touch of sadness at seeing my children grow up and move on — even though they were both in their mid-20s — but the overall feeling was one of excitement and gratitude to Hashem.

But when I discovered that my 26-year-old daughter Dini was going out seriously, I was furious. Absolutely livid.

It all started when that shadchan, Mrs. Moskowitz, called to suggest a boy named Yisrael Davis. “He’s everything you want for your daughter,” she raved. “Baal middos, serious about his learning, good family, yiras Shamayim.”

Having fielded shidduch calls for the better part of a decade, my antennae immediately went up. Where’s the catch? I thought.

“The thing is,” Mrs. Moskowitz continued, as if on cue,

“Yisrael was married for about six months and then divorced. No children. The marriage was, uh, unfortunate, but it doesn’t reflect negatively on Yisrael in any way. If anything, he came out of it stronger than before.”

She finished off her little speech with a flourish: “I think he’d be perfect for your Dini.”

What a chutzpah! I was so irritated, I had to hold myself back from hanging up the phone on her. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Moskowitz,” I said politely, “but my daughter is a wonderful girl, with not a problem to speak of, and she deserves better than this.”

“I understand you completely, Mr. Glicksman,” she responded. “I met your Dini, and I agree that she’s a catch. But so is Yisrael. The girl who gets him will be very lucky. What difference does it make that he was married before?”

“What difference does it make?” I asked pointedly. “Would you take used merchandise for your daughter?”

“Actually,” Mrs. Moskowitz said quietly, “I thought that I could suggest this shidduch to you because I myself married a boy who was divorced.”

I felt my face grow hot. “Oh,” I stammered. “I didn’t mean—”

“That’s okay,” she assured me. “I often get this type of reaction when I suggest a shidduch like this.”

I was embarrassed, but that didn’t mean I was going to agree to such a shidduch for Dini. “Dini’s only 26,” I explained. “I’m not about to consider something like that for her.”

“I was only 19 when I got married.”

“You were 19?” I echoed, leaving the rest of my question hanging in the air: Why on earth would you have married a divorced boy if you were only 19? Did you have some sort of problem?

“I was a regular girl from a regular family,” she said, in answer to my unspoken question. “But my parents were smart enough to look past externals and see that this boy would be a good husband and make me happy. And they were right.”

I found myself starting to feel irritated again. “I don’t know,” I said. “It doesn’t sound right for Dini.”

“Just look into it,” she urged.

“Maybe,” I said evasively. “I’ll let you know if we’re interested.”

Later that evening, I sat down to supper with my wife

Zahava. Dini, who was the only child home, joined us, and I mentioned the conversation with Mrs. Moskowitz. “So this shadchan lady thinks that just because she married a divorced guy, everyone else should too,” I said, between mouthfuls.

“And?” Zahava asked. “Did you tell her no way?”

“I said maybe I’d look into it.”

“Will you?” That was Dini.

“Not now,” I said. “Maybe after Succos.”

“But Ta,” Dini objected, “it’s just after Pesach! Why wait half a year?”

“You know I don’t believe in rushing into things,” I said.

“Especially a complicated situation like this. After Succos you’re going to turn 27. If he’s still around, we can think about it. But I’m hoping that in the meantime something better will come up.”

“Nothing great has come up in a long time,” Zahava reflected.

It was true — Dini wasn’t getting very many suggestions, and even those that did trickle in were not appropriate for a girl of her caliber. Boys from weird backgrounds, boys from the wrong type of yeshivos, boys with issues. Dini deserved better than that — and the fact that she had been in shidduchim for several years made her more deserving, not less. It wasn’t bad enough she had to wait, she also had to settle for some second-rate

husband?

Dini had begun shidduchim at the age of 23, when her older sister Bracha had gotten engaged. In the three years that had elapsed, she had gone out with only two boys. Suggestions were sparse, and those that did come in were mostly not suitable.

But I wasn’t going to let her go out with just anyone. When the right one would come along, she’d go out with him, and in the meantime, we’d just have to be patient.

Patience, in my opinion, is a quality that is sorely lacking in today’s generation. Everything nowadays has to be instant — instant coffee, instant messaging, instant gratification. Even shadchanim expect an answer almost instantly!

When I check out a prospective husband for my daughter, you can be sure that I’m going to take my time and leave no stone unturned. How could I let her go out with a boy before I’m 100 percent sure that he’s right for her?

I certainly wasn’t going to waste all that time looking into a shidduch that was so obviously not for Dini. If that Moskowitz calls again, I resolved, I’m going to tell her to peddle her

secondhand wares elsewhere.

A few days later, Dini approached me tentatively and asked what had happened with the shidduch. “I told you,” I said. “This isn’t for us.”

She opened her mouth to say something, but then thought better of it.

Thankfully, Dini got very busy over the next few weeks, and I didn’t see much of her. When she was around, she didn’t ask me anything about the shidduch — which I was happy about, because I thought it was inappropriate and unbecoming for a young girl to be busy with her own shidduchim. Shidduchim are the parents’ job. Period.

You can imagine my shock, then, when my oldest daughter Yocheved, who lives in Lakewood, mentioned to me on the phone oh-so-casually that Dini was dating Yisrael Davis.

“She went out with him a couple of times from my house,” Yocheved said lightly. “He looks like a really nice boy.”

I almost dropped the phone. “What?” I sputtered. “Dini is

going out? Who gave her the right? I didn’t even check the boy out! How dare she? Whose idea was this?”

“It’s okay, Ta,” Yocheved assured me. “Dini looked into the boy, and Betzalel and I also made some inquiries. We heard only good things.”

“Never mind what you heard!” I snapped. “What business does a young girl have making shidduch inquiries? How could she go out behind my back? And how could you be party to such a thing?”

“Ta,” Yocheved’s voice was serious, “Dini is 26. She’s old enough to make decisions on her own.”

I felt my shoulders sag. “I can’t believe what I’m hearing,”

I said. “Who gave her the right?”

“Actually,” Yocheved replied, “Dini discussed it at length with daas Torah. She sat with Betzalel’s rav, and he paskened that she’s allowed to say yes to the shidduch without your approval, and that she shouldn’t tell you until things get serious.

“You should know,” Yocheved continued, “Dini was very

hesitant to go ahead with this. She asked the rav whether it’s okay to wait until after Succos, as you had wanted to do. ‘If it’s bashert,’ she said, ‘won’t this boy still be around in six months?’ And the rav said no, that’s not the right way to look at it.”

When I hung up the phone with Yocheved, I felt terribly hurt. My own children had colluded against me, cutting me out of Dini’s shidduchim and rushing headlong into a situation that I knew was not right for Dini.

I was in for another unpleasant surprise when I indignantly told Zahava about the conspiracy, and she didn’t look particularly unnerved.

“You knew about this?” I asked in disbelief.

“I didn’t exactly know,” she hemmed. “But I had a vague idea. Haven’t you noticed that Dini’s been skipping out to Lakewood every few days? I figured that it must have something to do with a shidduch, but I decided to respect her space and stay out of it.”

“What?” I said. “I didn’t even realize she was going to Lakewood!”

My own words hit me in the face like a splash of ice water. I didn’t even know where my daughter was. I have no idea how she’s spending her time, or who she’s with. And I think I know what’s best for her? What is she, six years old?

I felt punctured, deflated. “Do you know how many times she’s gone out?” I asked. “Yocheved said a couple — does that mean two? Three?”

“I haven’t been counting the trips to Lakewood,” Zahava

answered. “But I’d be shocked if they’ve gone out less than five or six times.”

“Five or six times?” I felt the hurt flaring inside me again. “And they’re only telling me now?”

“My guess is that they’re almost ready to get engaged,” Zahava said. “They’re probably trying to break the news to us slowly.”

“Get engaged?” I exclaimed. “What is this, an instant match? Just add water and mix?”

Zahava shrugged. “I know you like to take your time. But when you leave something for too long, it could spoil, you know?”

“We managed to marry off three children my way,” I retorted. “I don’t know why Dini has to be different.”

“I don’t know why, either,” Zahava said quietly. “But what we did for the others obviously wasn’t working for her. Sometimes a parent’s job is to take the reins, and sometimes our job is to close our eyes and let things happen.”

Sometimes our job is to close our eyes and let things happen.

Did that mean I should close my eyes to the fact that my own daughter was going out behind my back? Did that mean I should close my eyes to the fact that she was dating a divorced boy?

Yes, a voice in my head said. It’s her life. If she’d rather be

married to this boy than not be married at all, what business is it of mine to stand in her way?

For the rest of the day, I walked around alternating between feelings of betrayal and feelings of self-recrimination: Why was

I so quick to dismiss a shidduch? Why didn’t I even think of considering Dini’s opinion?

By the time I went to sleep that night, I realized that there was no point in playing the blame game. It didn’t matter if Dini was wrong or I was wrong or everyone was wrong. This shidduch was probably going to happen, and it was up to me whether to be sore about what happened, or be gracious.

I’m going to be a gentleman, I decided. Rather than throw a

tantrum, I’m going to do my fatherly duty by investigating this

Yisrael Davis myself and making sure that he’ll make a good

husband for my daughter.

I also promised myself that I would take no longer than 48 hours to do my checking. If Dini is ready to get engaged, I thought, I’m not going to be the one holding her up.

Making inquiries in quick succession went completely against my grain. I was used to making one phone call, then mulling over what the person had said for a few days, and then proceeding to the next phone call. But here I was calling one person after another, processing the information instantly, and then figuring out whether I needed further confirmation of a particular point, or whether I could move on to asking about something else.

The information I heard was quite positive. There were a few things I was concerned about, especially because of the divorce, but speaking to Yisrael’s rebbeim dispelled those concerns. Of course, there was still the fact that he was divorced… but it was really Dini’s choice whether she was comfortable with that.

Dini was in Lakewood during those two days, and I didn’t hear from her. By the time she came home, I had made peace with

Yisrael Davis becoming my son-in-law.

When I heard her enter the house, I went over to greet her. “I want you to know,” I said, “that I looked into this Yisrael and he seems to be a very fine fellow. I’m happy for you to continue going out with him.”

A look of immense relief washed over Dini’s face. “Oh, Tatty,” she said, “you don’t know how much that means to me. We were basically ready to get engaged, but I just couldn’t do it without your blessing.”

So Zahava was right, I thought. She hadn’t just gone out “a couple of times.” She just needs my blessing, and poof — an instant match!

That was painful. But I was determined not to project my pain onto Dini. She hadn’t meant to make me suffer — she was just

doing what she thought was right.

Speaking of what was right, it was high time I called back that Mrs. Moskowitz with an answer. And a thank you. And maybe an apology, too.  —

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