words 2005 Janis Spindel is on her way from her office on the Upper East Side of Manhattan to a nearby cafe to meet a gorgeous guy. ”Gorgeous,” she tells me. ”Unreal. He’s just my type — 36, Jewish, A decked-out and eye-catching 49-year-old, Janis is, by her estimation Gorgeous (the description proved accurate) is lounging in one of the Gorgeous was intrigued when Janis strode over to him a few days earlier Gorgeous gets down to business: What are her fees? Janis is a persuasive sort. She has the glitzy confidence — and look Gorgeous tries to negotiate the price, but Janis flatly refuses. Then This strikes me as an extremely realistic concern. How else to describe ”No, no, no, no,” Janis now tells Gorgeous in her rapid-fire style, Gorgeous asks if he’ll be able to see photographs, and Janis again says After he leaves, I ask Janis what kind of women she would set Gorgeous Janis dismisses my suggestion quickly: ”It’s not happening for her,” I assume that this meeting will be the last Janis will hear of Gorgeous But this was not the last Janis heard from Gorgeous. A few days later, ”It would take me meeting 100 girls to find the one who clicks,” How did he come to have more faith in Janis’s ability to filter than in ”It’s harder to see yourself as you truly are,” he says. ”Janis was Souring on the For many of the matchmakers’ clients with whom I spoke, Internet dating But there are also deeper, more psychological reasons that draw people The Mother ”I listen to what men say they want, and then I give them exactly Janis’s women fill out a brief questionnaire in which they answer basic ”If you give the client beauty — and brains and athletic abilities, A done deal? Aren’t those categories awfully broad? What about She looks at me curiously, as if I hail from a different planet, where After the first date, Janis will elicit feedback from her client, and Clients usually shape right up, she says, and focus on their (her) Interiors vs. Exteriors Obviously, part of the secret of a matchmaker’s success is that by the I love to matchmake. (I have had a hand in four marriages — as well as But professional matchmakers match exteriors. They have a finely honed Behind this kind of matchmaking lies a deep distrust of romance, as we The new matchmakers take a traditional approach. They believe that Of course, you wonder if these kinds of matches actually last, or None of the professional matchmakers keep track of their divorce rates The Ultimatum On a recent afternoon, she was having lunch with a 47-year-old man from ”I see the same women on the site, year after year, getting older, no Westchester makes a lot of jokes, which do not seem to amuse Janis. Janis asks a few questions about what he wants (”nice,” ”down to No, Janis tells him, if he hires her, he has to get his place ready for He likes Westchester, he explains; it’s quiet and pretty. He has lived Is he ”where he wants to be” with his job, Janis queries (i.e., can ”I think so,” he says. ”No Manhattan woman is going to date someone in Westchester,” Janis When Janis tells him the price of her services, his face falls. Is Janis dismisses the idea with a wave of her hand. ”Look,” she says, I see from his pained expression that Janis has struck a nerve. The The Audition This afternoon they are sitting primly, their legs crossed, in outfits Indeed, it emerges that the woman works as a model for Penthouse and Janis wastes no time. ”Are those real?” ”Well, I had large breasts,” Buxom says plaintively, as if to say Janis asks about her hair, and she admits that she is wearing a wig ”What color is your hair normally?” ”I can do any color,” she says timidly. Janis snorts. ”Normally. What are you normally when you go out?” ”Blond, I guess,” she says uncertainly. She plays with her white Buxom’s goals are the same as those of the other women: she wants a After she leaves, Janis calls a client. Although she doesn’t usually Now she’s on the phone with the man. ”Forget it,” Janis barks. ”I They argue for a few minutes and then Janis hangs up. ”He wants to A Matchmaker’s Intuition ”I’m clairvoyant,” Janis says. ”I remember once I was sitting on an As with many of her male clients, Janis found Bookish on her own, ”Then Janis walked in, in all her splendor,” he recalls. Bookish has A long, romantically bleak year later — having attended a ”hideous” ”I trust Janis,” he says, and ”I like her,” and he says he believes He also got to know her husband, a personal trainer who sometimes works ”Perhaps she married for love,” Bookish says with a laugh. The Mitzvah Among certain immigrant groups in this country, like those from Or sometimes a town is just lucky and someone has a calling. Florence ”One might ask if there is a matchmaker gene, because her matches seem Unlike the high-powered businesswomen of the matchmaking world, Florence is a short, cozy, dark-haired 60-year-old whom people describe She had invented a rule for the setup: the couple had to promise to go On first dates, people are heavily influenced by perceptions of Twenty-five years ago, Florence chose a new colleague at the hotel ”All summer, I walked around the Cornell campus, looking for a tall ”I am fearless when it comes to matching,” she says in a way that Once Florence inscribes someone in her head, she doesn’t cross him or Florence’s interest, on the other hand, made him feel nurtured. He Although Florence doesn’t know many women in his area, once a year or Persuasion At times it strikes me that she talks about marrying as if it were I first heard of Florence through her son, Larry, who is a friend of In the following months, I was unable to shift Florence’s attention to I demurred. Nothing against Princeton, I explained, but an absence of a Did I imagine that he wasn’t literary enough? Florence wondered. ”He When successive e-mail messages over the course of the year revisited But interest for a driven matchmaker is neither here nor there. Although I had denied it, Florence was convinced that I was not drawn ”I am wondering,” she concluded, ”if you should consider changing The Socialite Samantha was once in Janis’s databank. (Janis says she believed Upstairs at Barneys one wintry afternoon, Samantha was doing a shopping Downtown is examining a skimpy miniskirt when we arrive, though nothing ”You’re still going to look sexy,” Samantha assures her. ”But guys ”I get a lot of compliments — I can’t walk by a doorman without being Samantha gives her a you’re-not-going-to-be-dating-doormen look. Samantha describes Downtown as ”a bit of a lost soul.” She worked in She thinks now of the boys she knew at her prep school — nice, bright, Samantha’s Pitch In 1999, she set up shop, Samantha’s Table, an Upper East Side Most of Samantha’s clients are in her peer group — age 27 to 50. ”I don’t work with people who aren’t popular and interesting,” she What happens — I ask — when a client’s problem finding love is more ”Those people don’t come to me,” Samantha asserts without missing a Samantha’s matching method, like Janis’s, is frighteningly simple. However, she tells me tartly, ”they can’t put 20 things on their Clients generally, and particularly female clients, cannot afford to be ”Clients have to commit to listening to what I say,” Samantha says. Samantha’s clients, like the clients of other matchmakers, like having After a consultation with a client, Samantha goes home and starts How she picks the most likely prospect for the first date is hard for Samantha not only picks the dates; she also sets the time and place of After the date, Samantha calls both parties and gets feedback. Often Simply having a matchmaker, she says, can help clients. With female Her dating advice has been finely honed in the last six years. ”I know Chatting ”Hey, Sam,” a group of guys call, and she turns and gives them a It isn’t the actual topics, I realize: no one cares what I think about So Samantha’s advice had been right — for her market. Advice Samantha likes to micromanage her clients’ relationships. She Believing In my mind, (almost) all my relationships have been dear. It’s not I believed that I would spend my life with my ex-fiancé. But we didn’t This, at any rate, is the way I understand my life. But this is not the Yet she is single herself, I point out: surely she doesn’t see her own But apparently she does. A look I have never seen before — dreamy and Although everything about modern culture has shown that vows do not |
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