A Word From the Weiss

        Chhhhh-appy Chanukah to all my readers! Well, as happy as it can be, anyway. It’s not as though we ever get to enjoy the treats and trappings of our own December holiday in peace. Never mind having most cities in the Western World and your entire surrounding neighborhood lit up like Mardi Gras, and a continuous soundtrack of insipid Muzak-al tidings of comfort and joy blaring over the P.A. in the supermarket and mall. What irks me most is that every TV talk show I watch suddenly has a one-track mind, offering tips on how to cook for holidays parties, dress up for holiday parties, and use dryer lint, buttons and felt to make everything in your house look like a snowman, Santa or sleigh (and other such crafty sleights of hand in which I don’t have the slightest interest).
        For me, holiday decorating consists solely of finding and de-waxing the menorah. And I don’t know about you, but as a Jew I haven’t thrown or been invited to a single holiday party since the first Bush Administration.
        But I don’t mean to sound like such a party-pooper or Jewish Scrooge. (A Jewge?) For in fact, regardless of the holidays, the past week has featured more than enough parties for one nice Jewish mama, along with all the attendant preparations and drama.
        The saga started last Tuesday morning, when my daughter Allegra called to report that Stevo, her boyfriend, had announced that he wasn’t coming for New Year’s Eve. My recollection was that after he had moved to L.A. in October for a great job, she had agreed to fly out for Thanksgiving and he would join her in New York for New Year’s. Now it had turned out that his family was going away for the holidays and would not be back until January 2. He would try to visit her for a few days after that, but she’d be back at work by then, and the intrinsic romance of the Eve itself would already have passed.
        Allegra tried not to sound too disappointed, but I could tell she was feeling glum. She had long resigned herself to the fact that her boyfriend was going to miss her 22nd birthday over last weekend, as well. As often happens with people born in December, half of her friends couldn’t make the party either because they had more pressing engagements, like final exams, flying home for the holidays or an early Hanukkah dinner at Grandma’s.
        Why, my husband and I weren’t even going to be in New York to take her out, since we had to attend an engagement party for some close friends’ daughter (not that Allegra actually would have wanted her parents at her party, which was slated for 10 p.m. to 3 a.m. on Saturday night and intended for her much younger and hipper friends).
        As any mother would understand, the last thing you want is for your child to be feeling downhearted and disappointed, particularly on his or her birthday. So I spent much of that afternoon mulling over how I might help in some way. And suddenly, it came to me. An inspiration. Well, make that a slightly far-fetched but fully do-able plan.
        Allegra had already posted invitations on Facebook, so there was no way for her party to be a surprise. But what if it were livened up by the appearance of a surprise guest? A surprise guest who would truly be a surprise? And I knew just who it could be.
        Back when Allegra was first applying to music colleges, a sort of musical comedy of errors ensued. Another girl her age who was also an aspiring jazz singer had applied to all of the same schools. And throughout the application process and live auditions, people had kept mixing the two of them up. It wasn’t just that my daughter (below, right) is named Allegra Colette Levy and this girl (at left) happened to be named Alessandra Gabrielle Levy. They also actually looked alarmingly alike, with similar facial features and physiques.
        The situation resolved when Allegra eventually entered New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, and Alessandra wound up at the University of Miami. So never did the twain actually meet.
        They had remained Facebook friends over the years, though, and Allegra mentioned her periodically, often showing me photos at which we would truly marvel. (Why, as if bizarre coincidences would never cease, Alessandra’s family dog, left, even looked almost exactly like our late dog Zoe!)
        So we began to sometimes refer to my daughter’s near clone as “Bizarro Allegra,” after a memorable episode of Seinfeld in which Elaine befriends a new group of guys who are strangely inverted versions of her customary Seinfeld cohorts. Then there was that other famous episode in which George, played by Jason Alexander, keeps proclaiming with increasing distress that when different aspects of your life begin to intersect, like Relationship George and Independent George, the earth will blow up. “Worlds collide, Jerry! Worlds collide!”
        If I could get Alessandra to make an appearance at my daughter’s birthday party, I thought it would cause the opposite of distress. Allegra would be amazed and delighted. I also believed it wouldn’t be all that hard to orchestrate this sort of a world collision. After graduating last May, both girls had moved to New York to pursue their singing careers, yet never had managed to quite get their acts together to come face to face (although Allegra’s good friends Aubrey and Katie had run into Alessandra one night). All I would have to do was contact Alessandra. And these days, that would be a snap.
        Or more like a click. After all, she and Allegra had remained friends on Facebook, and along with being Allegra’s devoted nice Jewish mom, I was one of her “friends” too.
        I didn’t think it would work for me to try to “friend” Alessandra too, out of the blue. Instead, I sent her a private message, although (being a bit of a novice about Facebook protocol) I wasn’t certain it would reach her if we weren’t already connected. I explained this in my missive, noting that I was Allegra’s mom and had something I needed to ask her. “Don’t worry,” I concluded, “this is nothing weird or skeevy. I am really Allegra’s mom.”
        Soon after sending this, I began to panic, wondering if I’d gone over the line or lost my mind. As much as I thought this was an inspired scheme, I realized it was more than a little intrusive into my daughter’s business. Should a woman of 22 really have her mother insinuating herself into her private life and issuing party invitations on her behalf?
        But when I got a reply within a few hours, I also realized there was no turning back.
        “Hi! How are you?” Alessandra asked, inserting a little smiley face, which I found more than a little encouraging. “Nice to virtually meet you.”
        “So nice to meet you too -- Allegra's virtual twin!” I replied. “I know it is insane that I wrote to you, but I had this sudden impulse this afternoon. Let me explain.” Then I laid out the whole sad saga, about the absent long-distance boyfriend, the many friends who couldn’t make Allegra’s party, and her understandable malaise. “I had this crazy idea that if you were around, maybe you could be a surprise guest,” I concluded. “I know you two have never met, but still… I could give you the address. Are you possibly around?”
        To my great embarrassment, I couldn’t figure out whether this message had gone through. It disappeared, and I thought I’d lost it, so I painstakingly reconstructed it and pressed “send” again. Then I felt like a total fool when minutes later it appeared in print in duplicate. “Sorry,” I wrote in the apology I sent explaining this.  “I can’t do Facebook. I’m just a mom.”
        No problem. She responded – in singular – in minutes. “Yes, I should be around!” she wrote, punctuating this with another smiley face, which assured me that no offense or annoyance had been taken; after all, she no doubt had a middle-aged mother, too. “I’ll bring a roommate,” she added, noting that she lived only three stops away on the subway.
        “You're kidding!” I wrote back, overjoyed. “That's amazing!” I noted that I’d planned to suggest she bring a friend.  (After all, it seemed unreasonable to expect her to show up alone at a party where she would know no one, or to travel around late at night without an escort.)
        Then I continued to natter on. “I’ll figure out the details so that you have no trouble getting in (although, honestly, I think the doorman would think you were her... or her twin),” I said. “Do you know how to get to Roosevelt Island” Then I gave the address, adding that my son, Allegra's older brother, would be there and a number of her friends, mostly other musicians and singers.
        Perhaps I should have left well enough alone at that point, but I’m someone who likes to see to every possible detail because I always worry that things will fall through. So I wrote yet again, giving landmarks to find Allegra’s apartment and supplying my son’s cell phone number in case she ran into any trouble, as well as Allegra’s cell number and my own. “Thanks for doing this!” I concluded. “She will be thrilled!”
        I myself was ecstatic, believing that I had deftly and single-handedly orchestrated what was either a very novel surprise and/or one of the greatest party gags imaginable. I began to envision the look on my daughter’s face when her door suddenly opened on Saturday night and in walked… her face!
        Then again, I’m not just a mother first and foremost. I’m also an obsessive worrier. So when Alessandra failed to reply or acknowledge either of my last two messages, and days passed, I began to fret. Why had I blabbered on so much and shown myself to be such a noodge? Every one of my notes to her had been an excessively lengthy and chatty paragraph, almost a novel, even without the inclusion of smiley faces and other such “emoticons.” Each of her responses, however sweet, had been short, no more than a phrase or two.
        Had I come across as such a nut job that she had come to realize she should flee for her life and not get involved with my family because I would clearly never leave her alone?
        Or, even more likely, wasn’t it highly possible, given the holiday season, that as the week progressed she would get other offers for Saturday night, or she’d come down with a cold, or her mother would make her go to Grandma’s for dinner, or she’d fail to convince a friend to accompany her on this mission and ultimately decide not to go? (Sorry to sound like such a worrywart, but as you can see, just as I leave no stone unturned when I make arrangements, I leave no roadblock unconsidered when I fret.)
        If I wrote back to her again over the following days, though, with a gentle reminder, wouldn’t this annoy her even further and potentially become a self-fulfilling prophesy?
        Given all of these potential ways in which my scheme might fall through, I decided not to mention anything to Allegra. Yes, it might perk her up a bit to know that a surprise was in store for her that weekend. But how much more crestfallen she would then feel if the surprise never actually arrived. There was also the possibility that she would begin to imagine that the surprise was that Stevo was coming, after all. Or that perhaps I had overestimated the potential positive impact of this little thrill I’d tried to arrange.
        Then again, I had reason to believe that I hadn’t misjudged this at all. When I couldn’t stand to keep my plan to myself any longer, I let it slip to my husband that I’d procured a surprise guest. I declined to reveal this person’s identity because I didn’t want to risk having him let anything about it slip to Allegra. But of course he proceeded to barrage me with 20 questions, or at least 18 (a nice Jewish number).
        Was it someone with whom she had gone to college? High school? Elementary school? Camp? No, no, no and no.
        Was this an old friend? A new friend? A Gentile friend? A Jew friend? Or, as Dr. Seuss might put it, did she meet her in a house? Did she meet her with a mouse? Did she meet her in a box? Did she meet her eating lox?
        They hadn’t been in any plays together I said, or ever shared a stage together. They hadn’t met on any of our vacations or on her Birthright trip to Israel last summer. They hadn’t worked together or flown together or done anything else known together. Why, I finally confessed, they had never even met.
        Why would Allegra want someone she had never met to come to her birthday party, unless it was someone famous, and why would someone famous want to come?
        Then, suddenly, lightning stuck. “Unless, of course, it has to do with the way that person LOOKS! Or could it be her NAME?" At which point my face turned so red that I had to drop the charade.
        “How did you know?” I asked.
        “I’m not stupid,” he replied.
        As we all know now, (nice Jewish) Father never, or rarely ever, knows best. “Yeah, you kind of are,” I said. “Then again, if you managed to figure this out, maybe that means it actually makes sense, so it wasn’t such a dumb idea after all.”
        The hard part was convincing him not to breathe one word about it to Allegra, although when she sounded despondent, he couldn’t resist urging her to buck up because “you never know what’s going to happen. Maybe you’ll get a nice surprise.”
        Further corroboration that my plan wasn’t crazy came when I dared to clue my son in toward the end of the week. I figured that he had better know, since Alessandra had his number. Although I once again tried to let my mystery guest’s name remain just that – a mystery – he, too, proceeded to bombard me with questions. (Did she meet her on a train? Did she meet her on a plane?) But, somehow, he also managed to figure it out.
        “Oh, God, Allegra’s really going to flip,” Aidan assured me, agreeing that this was a sure way to liven up the party. So historic a meeting was so compelling, in fact, that he thought he would probably be able to lure other people there just to witness it.
        He also proceeded to tell me about a boy he’d seen around campus throughout his years of college who could have been his identical twin, with one very minor exception: This talented theater student was unquestionably and unabashedly gay (not that there’s ANYTHING wrong with it, as Seinfeld, and now the U.S. military, would say). So many of Aidan’s friends noticed the astonishing resemblance, in fact, that they repeatedly reported sightings of this boy and eventually made up a name for him, which Aidan was a little abashed to relay to me, and I am more than a little abashed to repeat to you. (OK, my sincere apologies to anyone who may be offended by this, but they called him “Gaydan.”)
        Finally, at the end of their senior year, Aidan dared to approach this classmate, who seemed totally perplexed and failed to see any resemblance. As supporting evidence of his own claim, Aidan emailed me photos of the fellow appearing in a play. And I can honestly assure you, this boy looked exactly like my son. Or almost exactly. He was Aidan, only… Well, you get the picture (not that there’s anything wrong with it).
        But you simply will have to take my word for it because he forwarded the photos to me only on the strict condition that I promise not to post them on my blog.
        Meanwhile, as the week progressed, other elements of drama developed. After Stevo had let Allegra down about New Year’s, I’d begun to wonder, I must confess, if he would at least manage to get a gift to her in time for her birthday. Not that I’m a materialistic person, mind you; it’s the thought that counts, as they say, and as a parent it was evidence that my daughter’s boyfriend not only was thinking about her but also cared enough to think ahead that counted. And in this case, he’d have to think way ahead. This is a busy time of year for UPS and its ilk, to say the least. Also, given that her birthday fell on Sunday, and that few of those services deliver on weekends, it would need to arrive by Friday or else.
        So I was delighted when she called on Friday morning to report that a large box had just arrived, although Stevo had insisted that she wait two days until her birthday to open it. He’d also confessed in the same breath that he hadn’t gotten her anything especially nice this year, but vowed to do better next year. She had an irresistible urge to tear it open nonetheless, and then proceeded to periodically text me about this sense of unbearable temptation throughout the day. Could she open it anyway? Couldn’t she?
        Finally, that evening, just as we were about to leave the house a little late to meet some friends at a restaurant for dinner, she called with the final result, which, given the suspense and length of her rather detailed account, immediately made us even later.
        Stevo had finally given her the go-ahead, and she’d pried open this very large box. Inside, she had found a very large quantity of bubble wrap.
        She pulled out all of the bubble wrap, and toward the bottom of the box, she finally came across a wad of rather tacky and badly wrinkled old Christmas wrapping paper.
        Inside the wrapping paper, there was a ball of crumpled up newspapers.
        Inside the newspapers, there was a small box. A very small, pale blue box.
        A very small pale blue box from Tiffany & Co.
        And inside this box there was a lovely, bean-shaped, sterling silver pendant, a classic design by Elsa Peretti, on a delicate silver chain, which (judging from the photo she proceeded to text) had already taken up permanent residence around her neck.
        Allegra is not a materialistic person by nature, though, either, and the thing that touched her heart like a torch igniting a bonfire was the amazing poem that Stevo had written for her and enclosed with all of that bubble wrap and the necklace. But she didn’t send a copy of it, and probably never will, so we all will simply have to take her word for it.
        She seemed so exhilarated, in fact, that I relaxed a bit, realizing that this might turn out to be an OK birthday for her after all, even if my surprise guest didn’t come through.
        By Saturday, though, I began to fret anew. It had now been four days since I’d heard from Alessandra. Should I send her a gentle reminder and ask if we were still on? Or hold my tongue and my tendency to blabber and just trust that the stars would align?
        Finally, just before leaving for the engagement party, I wrote her another message. “At the risk of annoying you, dare I ask if you're still coming to Allegra's party?” I asked. I also appended a snippet from the party invitation that Allegra had posted on Facebook:
        "There will be festive holiday drinks, too much food, and a potential jam session if the spirits are high. Festive attitudes are appropriate, but tacky Christmas sweaters are not. EVER."
        Then I prepared myself for the worst. But within minutes, a response appeared: “yep probably be there sometime between 11-12,” it said.
        “Fabulous,” I wrote back. “You are the best! The best friend she's never met!!!!! Yet!”
        I assumed mine would be the final word and didn’t expect her to return the ball. But one more quick volley from my daughter’s double followed. “i told her back in the summer after having met aubrey and katie that if we met the world would explode haha. we'll see when it happens tonight.” Indeed.
        Given my level of breathless anticipation, it was a little tough taking off moments later for the engagement party, as thrilled as I was for my friends Amy and Rich and their bride-to-be, Stephanie, who looked radiant and breathless with anticipation herself. Still, how touching it was to be there as Rich eloquently and very emotionally gave a heartfelt toast, “standing on my grandmother’s rug… on what was my parents’ wedding anniversary… announcing my daughter’s engagement.” Talk about worlds colliding!
        It was tougher still making it through the rest of the day and night, wondering what was happening at Allegra’s party. I had been fantasizing all week that she would phone me after the big surprise and ask how I had pulled it off. But 11 p.m. came and went. Then midnight. Then 1 a.m. And the phone didn’t ring, once. There wasn’t even a text.
        Finally, at 1:45 even a night owl like me could keep her eyes open no longer. Knowing that Allegra’s party was slated to run till 3 a.m., though, I figured that she would sleep late the next morning and, as eager as we’d be to wish her a happy birthday, I didn’t want to risk waking her. So I fired off a text message asking her to let us know when she woke up.
        Seconds later, the phone rang. “What are you doing up so late?” she asked. Then, before I could even answer, she began shrieking excitedly. “Oh my God, guess who’s here!” Followed up by, “So, how did you ever do it?”
        Evidently, after 11:30, Aidan had starting growing skeptical that Alessandra would ever arrive (or maybe he just couldn't stand the suspense any longer) and he had mentioned to Allegra that a surprise guest was expected. But if that person didn’t ever show up, he said, he would tell her who was supposed to have come. Just before midnight, though, the door burst open. There was no knock. The doorbell didn't ring. She simply walked in with not one but two male friends, to Allegra’s complete shock and the amazement of everyone present.
        Alessandra was still there when we spoke at 1:45 a.m., and the party, which managed to continue past 3, was a resounding success. Everyone, by all accounts, had an incredible time.
        So, up close, did the girls actually look that much alike? You don’t need to take my word for it. You don’t need to take Allegra’s either (although she was incredulous). Many of the photos snapped went up on Facebook that very night. Take a look for yourself!
        What would you say – separated at birth? The same eyes. The same mouth. Almost the same hair and nose.
        Clearly, they could be sisters. In fact, when Allegra announced that they were joking about starting a girls’ singing group, my good friend Catherine came up with the perfect name -- The Levy Sisters (like the Lennon Sisters, only more, er, Jewish… although Allegra says that Alessandra is only part Jewish and was not raised that way).
        Catherine also had another, alternate name for the band: Worlds Collide.
        Meanwhile, I just came across another young soulful singer online named Jennifer Levy who is evidently from Canada but is trying to establish a music career for herself in New York. Maybe she could round out the trio. Or who knows? Maybe, just in case Stevo doesn’t do better next year by actually showing up, I just might have another little surprise up my sleeve.
        Or perhaps, for once, I should learn to quit while I'm ahead. Aidan has already made me swear that I won’t attempt to get in touch with his own doppelganger and pull this kind of a stunt when his birthday rolls around.
(“I do not like surprises, Ma’am. I do not like them, NiceJewishMom.com-I-am!”)