Dinner Party

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A while ago, I heard from Wiley that he had learned of the existence of a gay couple living in Tzfat, as they had recently been hired as coaches for his company. He didn't pass on their contact information to me because he didn't want to compromise their privacy. But when Moshe visited for Shabbos a few weeks ago, he mentioned that there was an article on glbtjews.org that mentioned a gay couple living in Tzfat, named David Fyffe and Arlan Wareham. I figured that it had to be the same couple that Wiley had mentioned, and some quick googling turned up Arlan's web site. I read a large chunk of their chronicle of their immigration to Israel, and thus discovered Arlan's Skype user-name, with which I sent him a quick message to say, "Hi, I thought you might be interested to know of another queer person in town." Just a few emails later, we'd set up last night as a date for Arlan and David to come over to my apartment for dinner.

The dinner was just lovely. I made my tried-and-true recipe for curried vegetables and tofu over brown rice, and we sat around eating and chatting for over two hours. David's quiet and sensitive, while Arlan's more bold and garrulous. Like most people, they were duly impressed by Dad's reaction to my coming out. I liked hearing their story of how they met and got together, and I also enjoyed discussing Arlan's recent ventures in musical composition for organ. Before they left, we made plans for me to visit them for Shabbos next week. I can't wait to meet their snakes.