Marriage Matters

Mixed Marriages

young children, ages 5, 4 and 2, Jaffe is passionate
about the need for couples to work out their reli-
gious differences in a climate of respect and under-
standing
"Are you a couple with a shared vision, working
out a problem that has arisen between you, or are
you two individuals living together trying to fix the
other person who has become a problem?" asks
Jaffe.
"Remember the person you fell in love with,"
she advises.
Numerous case studies of couples from across
the country and across the religious spectrum are
included in the book, as are sections of advice from
rabbis, marriage counselors and others offering sug-
gestions for reconciliation and growth.
"[The] aim,"lArrites Jaffe, "is to help you ask the
right questions, to learn from other couples who have
resolved similar problems, and to pass along what the
teachers in our tradition convey about the subject."
Two Jews Can Still Be a Mixed Marriage covers
this complex topic in a well-organized and thor-
ough manner. The book's introduction and begin-
ning chapters explain the ideals of Jewish marriage
and the concepts of beshert, destined spouse, and
shalom bayit, domestic harmony.
The fears which religious conflict within a mar-
riage may arouse are discussed — everything from
a breakdown of the marriage to worries about
being asked to make sacrifices or to adopt new
behaviors
"Disagreeing is so ... Jewish," says Jaffe. Yet, she
adds, "to struggle as a couple with Jewish matters is
something to be celebrated. It is the Jewish couple who
is not grappling with these issues that I worry about."

.

A new book helps Jewish couples
reconcile their religious differences.

SUSAN TAWIL

Special to the Jewish News

S

he wants ro keep kosher but he doesn't.
He wants to go to shul to say Kaddish
for his father; she thought they didn't
believe in ritualistic Judaism — and how
will he have time to drive the carpool?
After talking with the neighbors, she suddenly
wants to send the kids to a Jewish day school; he
thinks the idea is ridiculous — and expensive to
boot.
He thinks it would be nice if she'd light Shabbat
candles and make chicken soup on Friday nights;
she wants to go to the movies.
What to do? Fight? Insult each other? Grow
apart? Divorce?
How about reading a book?

Two Jews Can Still Be a Mixed Marriage:
Reconciling Differences Over Judaism in Your
Marriage, by Azriela Jaffe (The Career Press;

$14.99), is a practical guidebook for couples at dif-
ferent levels of Jewish observance who, despite their
differences, wish to maintain or establish a lasting,
loving relationship.
"Every marriage, even between two Jews, is an
intermarriage between two individuals with differ-

ent souls and back-
grounds," says Jaffe.
She should know.
Her husband,
Stephen, an
IFFERENCES
,M IN YOUR
accountant, was at a
CAGE
much higher level of
A21
AF I' E.
religious observance
333 A3.An i:*i
than she was when
they tied the knot.
The manner in which they've managed to resolve
their differences and not only maintain, but
strengthen, their seven-year marriage forms the
core premise of her book.
A seasoned writer, Jaffe, 40, a resident of
Newtown, Penn., has authored more than half a
dozen other books, most dealing with entrepre-
neurial couples in business together. They include

Honey, I Want to Start My Own Business: A
Planning Guide for Couples and Let's Go Into
Business Together: Eight Secrets to Successful Business
Partnering.

She also writes a syndicated business column,
"Advice from A-Z," and puts out online newsletters
for couples in business.
But in this, her latest book, Jaffe writes from
strong personal conviction. The mother of three

Addressing Adultery

In "Infidelity" Ann Arbor author Anne Pearlman
tells the true story of the devastating effects of
marital betrayal on three generations of Jewish
American women.

ALICE BURDICK SCHWEIGER

Special to the Jewish News

A

nn Arbor psychotherapist Ann Pearlman
thought she had an ideal marriage.
In the mid-1980s she had written Keep the

Home Fires Burning: How to Have an Affair
with Your Spouse, and appeared on Oprah and
Donahue speaking out about the joys of sexual

monogamy.
But unfortunately, after 30 years, she learned her
marriage was far from perfect: Her husband was hav-
ing an affair. •
In dealing with her anger and pain, Pearlman began
keeping a journal. "While I was writing in my journal,
childhood memories surfaced about my father and
grandfather cheating," says Pearlman, "so I wanted to

9 /1 5

'10

explore those memo-
ries once again and
share my experiences
in the form of a
book, hoping that
people going through
marital betrayal would see they are not alone."
The result is Infidelity: A Memoir by Ann Pearlman
(MacAdam/Cage; $22), a book that details three gen-
erations of marital philandering in one family. It hits
bookstores this month. Pearlman will read from her
memoir Sept. 19 at Nicola's Books on Plymouth Road
in Ann Arbor.
Pearlman candidly chronicles her life and marriage,
beginning with her early childhood and delving into
the marital lives of her grandparents and parents. Told
in the first person, Pearlman calls Infidelity a fictional-

ized memoir, because she changes the characters'
names to protect her children. Still, she doesn't hold
much back NArhile she revisits her emotional past.
"My grandfather was a physician, and during the
Depression he had an affair with a social worker at the
hospital," says Pearlman. "But my grandmother found
out about the affair and went to my grandfather's mis-
tress' parents and told them their daughter [was] creat-
ing a scandal.
"So the mistress' parents called a Jewish marriage
broker and got her out of town. Yet, she continued to
correspond with my grandfather until he died."
Pearlman's father, whom she calls "a serial philan-
derer," had numerous affairs. "My father was charm-
ing, good-looking and very successful, and wanted to
seduce lots of women," says Pearlman. He died in his
40s of a heart attack.
Pearlman's husband, an African-American
University of Michigan fine arts professor, had an
affair with a married Japanese student. "We were
invited to dinner at this married woman's home,"
recalls Pearlman, who met her husband at the
University of Iowa, where she spent a year before grad-
uating from the University of Pittsburgh. .
"It was apparent she was crazy about my husband.
As their working relationship continued, they spent
more time together, and I could tell he was changing.
He was increasingly enamoured with her, and I asked
him if he was having an affair, but he denied it.