My friend Ellen literally laughed in my face when I told her I was back on the market.

“Nobody who knows you is going to fix you up.”

She then may have said that she loved me. As in “I love you, Ron, but you can’t be serious.”

Her reaction was hardly unique.

Turns out a lot of people love me.

Well, I like a mystery as much as the next guy and was determined to understand why I had a black marker, in permanent ink, next to my name. I slowly began to piece it together. Here is what I came up with.

When people give you a woman’s phone number, it is probably a good idea if you eventually call that number.

In addition…

And this is something I take issue with.

If you call that number, you are then required to ask the woman out.

Back in the day, before my name was proverbial mud, I was introduced to a woman named Zoe. Or maybe it was the Salinger spelling, Zooey. Am really not sure.

Zoe or Zooey was not expecting my call. Much of the early part of the conversation was taken up with the investigative work of determining the link. Her cousin Lisa’s hairdresser. Or maybe her hairdresser’s cousin Lisa. Like I said, it was back in the day.

Once sufficiently satisfied with my provenance, we proceeded with the pas-de-deux dance of the initial phone call.

I am good on the phone.

Am just saying.

Remember, this was back before internet and texts. There was no Netflix and chill or sending vegetable emojis. This was our equivalent of our parents’ “we had to walk ten miles in waist-high snow in order to get to school.”

My friend Barry Simon believed in the motto that good phone is death. A good conversation was a very bad omen. Am not sure he was wrong.

But this phone call was not going to test his hypothesis. It wasn’t really going well. At one point I suggested jokingly that she was probably hoping that this would not work out. She wanted to know why I would say that. I replied that because then she would be known as Zooey Zevy.

And nothing.

Look. I’m not saying that it is a bon mot which would have Oscar Wilde worried about his standing.

But it was something.
An icebreaker.
Something.
But I got nothing.

I ended the conversation by not asking either Zoe or Zooey out.

But there was a time, before my likeness did double duty as a dartboard target, when I was an eligible bachelor who had, if not inundated, then certainly his fair share of fix-up opportunities.

I want to go on record by saying I resent the implication that I was picky or otherwise unreasonably selective. If I acquired that reputation, I firmly believe it was unearned. Nevertheless, the general perception was I had to be pitched the virtues of the would-be suitor with some sort of comprehensive marketing campaign.

These were some of the elevator pitches:

She has her own money
She is rich
She reads
She does crosswords
She lives in another city (not going to lie, that was a very compelling argument)
She golfs
She plays tennis
She loves foreign films

But the best pitch I ever heard was from my friend Avi about an Italian Jewish woman he once dated when he attended Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Here is what he said: “If my wife were to be hit by a bus tomorrow, I would be on the first flight to Milan.”

Do me a favor. Read it again.

Not if my wife left me. Not if I divorced my wife. No, if my wife got hit by a bus.

How beautiful is that.

Now that’s a strong recommendation.

As it happened, I was on my way to Italy. A group of us had rented a villa and had arranged for a bespoke cycling trip for the week. A hesitant flyer at the best of times, I was hard-pressed to make the crossing for only a week. So I was leaving a week earlier for some sightseeing and touring.

“You should call Michaela,” says Avi.

Michaela.

I call her. Unlike Zoe/Zooey, she is expecting my call.

She has a very good voice.

My friend Alan is recently divorced and has been going out on a slew of blind dates. “Only for coffee,” he says. “If it is brutal, I am only stuck for an hour.”

I could have met Michaela for coffee in Milan.

But that voice.

Instead, I decide to throw caution to the wind.

Carpe fucking diem.

I invite her to Tuscany for the weekend.

She says yes.

I have rented a villa in a small Tuscan town on the outskirts of Florence called Imprunetta.

I reserve two, count them, two rooms.

I send a limo to the Florence train station in order to pick her up.

Class? Your words. Not mine. But yeah, okay.

Michaela comes out of the limo. She lights a cigarette and takes her first drag before her feet hit the pavement.

We hug, I carry her bags (two bags—I had said weekend, hadn’t I?) to her room (the aforementioned second room) and we then walk to the Imprunetta Piazza—town square. It was a lovely piazza, with a magnificent church as its centerpiece.

We have dinner on the balcony of a (how close was I just there of saying an Italian) restaurant overlooking the piazza. It wasn’t just a balcony, it was a cupola. No. That doesn't seem right. A cupola is a dome. No. No. The word I am looking for is Juliet balcony.

We have a lovely dinner. It was, no question, a very romantic spot. She was a lovely woman. We told each other our stories. We then, inexplicably, shifted the conversation to politics.

Specifically, to Middle East politics. She was left-wing. Fair enough. Can’t throw a stone in Europe without hitting a cigarette-smoking leftist. Her political views, despite her religion, were those of an Italian leftist. That is to say, she was critical of Israel and Israeli policies in the, I guess the word I choose here is revealing. Let me use her words—Occupied Territories.

A deal breaker? That is a different discussion.

Can we just say her politics made her a tiny bit less attractive.

Basta.

The next day we set out for Sienna. My writing skills, as you have no doubt assessed, are somewhat limited, so I can’t really do justice to how winding and hilly the road from Florence to Sienna is. Can we be satisfied with windy and hilly? To make matters worse, I had decided, in an unhinged nod to the spirit of adventure, to rent a stick shift. It is a Fiat Uno. Now, I can drive a stick shift. I once owned a red Triumph Spitfire. (I know. You didn’t need to know it was red. Sue me.) And driving it on those streets can be really, really fun.

For the first 15 minutes.

Sienna is a beautiful city. It has a majestic piazza which, twice a year, turns into the oldest and most famous horse track in Europe. The races, dating back to the 16th century, pit 10 of Sienna’s 17 contrade—a contrada is a neighbourhood—against each other. The loyalties are fierce and it is not unheard of that marrying outside of your contrada will bring shame to your family.

Least while, it is what our tour guide Antonio told us on our bespoke tour of the city. Michaela was a charming and very pleasant companion and we had a lovely day—free of any political discussions. Things however, began to get rocky on our way home. She received a call from her friend Francesca. After a very animated discussion—isn’t every discussion in Italian very animated (grave danger, is there any other kind?)—Michaela gleefully turned to me and announced we had been invited to dinner.

In Pisa.

Of leaning tower fame.

Now, what I would like you to do is to stop reading and Google “distance between Sienna and Pisa.” Go ahead. I’m in no rush.

Got it?

122 km.

But that isn’t the entire story.

Now, check the time it takes on those windy and hilly roads.

1 hour and 43 minutes.

Now calculate me driving.

Now add the stick shift.

Now add jet lag.

I mention it only because when I tell this story someone, usually a complete stranger, will say, “Did you go?”

But my friends. Well my friends know better.

I said no.

Michaela was not very happy.

Molto infelice.

I’m sure there is a better word. A more apt word.

In Yiddish, the word is broigus.

For you native Italian speakers: if there is a better word, please let me know, and I’ll make the change.

She doesn’t speak to me for the rest of the ride. When we get to the villa she storms to her room without a buena sera. The sound coming from her room is the sound of a dresser being pushed against the door.

Molto infelice.

Alan Perez, at this point of the telling, he has now heard it four times will, on cue, pipe up and say, “You should have just gone for coffee.”

Questo e vero.

This is true.

I get up in the morning fully expecting that Michaela has decamped. But I find her having an al fresco breakfast on the verandah overlooking the olive groves.

Buongiorno Ronaldo.

I join her for a cappuccino.

She is in a great mood.

Ebullient.

I hum a little Patsy Cline to myself.

We share some grapes.

I ask her what time her train is.

She checks her ticket. 3:00.

Now I have said stupid things in my life. God only knows. Few, however, rival the words that then spew from my mouth.

“I will drive you to Florence. We can do some sightseeing.” She claps her hands with joy.

Best.
Idea.
Ever.

I don’t want to get into a conversation about Florence. To be fair, I have only been there in the summer when the city is invaded by throngs of tourists. What I will say is Florence is not a town for driving. The traffic and one-way streets make it veritably unnavigable. Michaela is not helpful. She must have been here dozens of times. But she acts like we are in Ulan Bator.

We finally find a parking lot.

“Allora. Shall we go to the Duomo?”

“No,” I say. “I have been to enough churches to last me a lifetime.”

So now the Michaela from I-don’t-want-to-go-to-Pisa makes an unannounced return. She calls me a philistine (only time ever—it is in my top ten of all-time insults).

“Where do you want to go?”

“How about the synagogue?”

I never go to synagogue. Not for bar mitzvahs. Not even the High Holidays. (Capitalized. Pascal’s Wager.)

Only exception are weddings. And even then, not a big fan.

But fuck it. We were in Florence. Let’s go to the beautiful and famous Sinagoga de Florencia.

We are now not walking together. She is a few steps ahead of me. There is a joke which I don’t remember. I think the least while is—landmines.

We get to the Sinagoga and we take separate tours. I make a detour to the synagogue office where I hand over my credit card in order to dedicate a chair to my late father—Italian was one of the seven languages he spoke—to his dying day, may he rest in peace, he answered the phone ‘pronto.’

I often try to remind myself that this story is not about my disastrous blind date in Italy but rather the time I honoured my father.

Tour over, all that is left is to get to the station. She turns left out of the Sinagoga. I say I think it is right.

She says no.

I say I am pretty sure.

She says no.

I point to the group of backpackers, clearly coming from the train station, who are on the right.

We go right.

Not walking together.

She consults her map every block.

The train station appears as a steel mirage in the distance.

We hug.

Three kisses on the cheek.

Doctor King’s words on my lips.

The next day she calls me to thank me and tell me what a lovely time she had.

I no longer speak to my friend Avi.

A year later my mother is meeting with her lawyer. He says he just came back from Florence.

He went to the Sinagoga.

He sat on the Marco Zevy chair.

So, not a bad date.

As my father would say:

Non troppo malle.

Not too bad.

The End.