It was March 1997 and I had left the East Coast to be closer to my family. In May I would be turning 30 and I was still single. My mom, horrified by this, quickly put an ad in the Jewish Bulletin for me without me knowing. An older lady with a Polish accent answered the ad and all I remember her saying on the voicemail is “I have a vunderful son.”
I was then immediately obligated to call the mother, according to my mom. I met her son, Joe, at Starbucks in San Mateo on March 27, 1997. That was the first time Joe’s mom had ever answered an ad for him. She did not tell him that she responded to my ad until after she had left the voicemail message.
What attracted her to my ad was the line “close to family and friends.” We were engaged three months later and married Feb. 14, 1998. We are very happily married, live in San Ramon and have two beautiful children, Sabrina, 3, and Adam, 1.