WHAT, YOU'D RATHER PLAY CANDYLAND THAN JEWISH GEOGRAPHY?

Subtitle: Could the world be any smaller? No. Impossible! Gornischt!

This story goes from St. Joseph to Chicago to DC and back to Denver. I was talking with my cousin Roberta (from St. Joseph) and her husband Mort (from Chicago), who met when they both lived in Denver and now live in D.C. Their daughter Rachel, who now lives here in Denver, wants to get into community theater. Mort asked if I have any connections. I told him that at that very moment Jay was playing golf with a friend, a Denver lawyer who’s an actor heavily involved in local theater, and that I'd ask him if Rachel could call him. This rang a bell with Mort. He said, “Hmmmm. Wait a minute. What’s your friend’s name?” I said, “Roger Simon.” He said, “You won’t believe this. but I know of a lawyer/actor named Roger Simon because my brother in Chicago is married to a woman whose sister Donna was once married to Roger Simon’s brother.”

I called Roger later and told him about this ferblundget connection. Roger, by training and talent, wasn't speechless, but I was astounded at how the game of Jewish Geography really does work. But wait — there's more!

A week later, Jay called me from the golf course. Roger and he had been rehashing the coincidence, and Roger mentioned off-handedly that Donna (my cousin's husband's sister-in-law’s sister) was the daughter of a Denver doctor named Eli Nelson. Wait till you hear THIS: Eli Nelson was the doctor who delivered Jay.

I'm waiting to hear that (a) Eli Nelson's wife's brother married my Grandma Borofsky's half sister or (b) that the chef at the restaurant we were going to that night is Roger’s sister’s grandson. Anything can (and does) happen.