The Ready-Made Husband

Marrying a divorced guy can be the solution to all your romance worries.

BETH LEE SEGAL
Special to The Jewish News

I

f your current boyfriend won't
take you home for Rosh
Hashanah, much less propose, I
have a suggestion. Find a guy
who was married before. As my thera-
pist friend Loretta says, "Men replace."
It worked for me.
I lived alone from the time I was 21
until I was 38, watching commitment-
shy boyfriends balk when I tried leaving
a toothbrush in their bathroom or a T-
shirt in their dresser drawer. But four
weeks after I met my fiance, Daniel, he
asked me to move in. The reason? He'd
been married for 24 years and was will-
ing to try it again. In addition to a
quick marriage proposal, there are other
advantages awaiting the never-married
woman who hooks up with a previous-
ly-wed man.

`-)

He Arrives Pre-Trained: Your sweet-
ie's first wife did the hard work of mak-
ing your mate an easy-to-live-with guy.
You'll be thanking her when you realize
your honey never drinks directly from
the milk canon and willingly uses only
the drugstore brand of shampoo, leav-
ing the $14 bottle of Nexus for you.

room for myself to appear an unsullied
and cool-headed arbiter of relationship
difficulties. This led him to put me in
charge of important domestic issues,
like the checkbook, and what color
sheets to buy.

Kids: The previously married
man often has them, and
you can work this to
your advantage.
Daniel's daughters
are now 24 and 26.
I've always made sure
to take the stance of
neutral
girlfriend/observer,
never questioning their
behavior and defend-
ing their mother if
Daniel criticized her.
Thus, the girls believe
I'll make a sane and judicious step-
mother. Mara, the oldest, recently told
me not to worry about having no chil-
dren of my own to look after me as I
age; she and her sister Jill would never
put me in a nursing home. I told them
I was putting them in my will.

He Doesn't Remember Dating:
Men who spent their 20s and 30s
dating, instead of married, are famil-
iar with the demented things people
do when they're looking for love, like
sneaking around your ex's lobby at 2
a.m. to see if he comes home with
someone else. By
carefully editing
your war stories,
they'll sound like
exciting adven-
. tures, not the dis-
turbing acting-out
that they really were.
Your previously-mar-
ried guy can then
bask in the
reflected glow of
your thrilling past,
because he doesn't
have one.

His Friends: An unexpected bonus.
My fiance and his pals are 10 years
older than I am, so they think he's lucky
to have gotten himself a young babe. I
get to fool myself into thinking I'm still
a young babe.

Your Family: Your new husband's
former in-laws were insane, but it'll be
a long time before he finds out how
nuts your parents are. That's because
they're so relieved that someone is
marrying you that they'll make gener-
ous gestures they normally wouldn't
extend. My parents buy Daniel better
birthday presents than they buy me
(real Breitling watch for him versus
fake pearls for me), and they've bribed
us by offering to pay for a four-star
hotel if we visit.

Romance: Your girlfriends will be
envious that you get flowers twice a
week from your honey, that he buys
you bangle bracelets from Tiffany's on
days other than Valentine's, and that
he'll keep looking deep into your eyes
even when you're in a downtown club
filled with models who have Italian
accents and no visible body fat. No
need to tell them that he didn't do
these things the first time he was mar-
ried, and that he's already promised
you he won't make the same mistakes
twice. (That's because you won't let
him.) ❑

Mother-In-Law Pluses: A Jewish
mother always takes her son's side. No
matter why his first marriage ended, its
his ex-wife's fault. This gives you extra
starter points — just because you're not
her.

"We Had One Of Those" Shopping
Sprees: Divorce inevitably means split-
ting up material possessions. My fiance
was left with circa-1979 den furniture,
while his ex got the 19th-century
antiques and silver flatware. By dragging
Daniel to auctions where nostalgia for
his old possessions took hold, I man-
aged to get a beautiful pine armoire, an
assortment of vintage photographs and
some rare Czech pottery for our home.

Benefit Of The Doubt: The longer
your fiance was married the first time,
the better. Daniel experienced over two
decades of marital discord. By subtly
encouraging him to accept blame for
theproblems he and his ex faced, 1 left

oozyng wit

the count
This year, the Wa s hington con
ence, will be March 22-24 at the .!.:..
Washington Hilton. Issues on the
docket include the pluralism debate,
specifically conversions accepted by
the Orthodox rabbinate in Israel;
funding issues with respect to govern-
ment cutbacks; and spirituality and
identity, according to Jim Rosenberg,
who heads die Young Adult Division

ve a
and come hack Wk..

lieva

fired up," Klein sue. Its the zhd
you'll ever have at a Jewish
The theme of this year's c *nil
is "passion to action, understanding
what it means to be part of a commu-
nity and why people need to partici-
pate and be involved," Klein says.
"We hope more of [the people who

For information or to register
for the UJA National Young
Leadership Conference, call
Tanya Mazor-Posner, (248) 203-
1456, or access the conference
web site, ww.washingtonll.org .

1/30
1998