The Crisis of Two Halves

Edging towards that time of life when men traditionally decide on having a mid-life crisis, it heartened me to meet Yitz an electrical engineer, who having experienced his own mid-life crisis, gave me some hope for the future.

Yitz turned up at my house to discuss a complicated rewiring strategy in order to incorporate the gardens lighting and swimming pool onto one circuit and maybe have the Shabbat clock turn on the Jacuzzi.

“Erm, you do realize I don’t know who you are or have a swimming pool and a Jacuzzi, but just out of interest how much will it cost?” After picking, myself up off the floor, and getting some semblance of reality into my head, I pointed him to the right address, shook his hand and said goodbye.

“Who was that?” my wife asked. “Yitz an electrical engineer, came to give a quote about rewiring the swimming pool, garden lights and putting the Jacuzzi on a Shabbat clock”. “How much was his quote?” “25,000 shekels”, I answered.

“We cant afford that! Get another quote, here I’ll find the numbers and you can call from work. I wont have time, what with my own work and the kids”.

I prayed that reality would return once more. “Darling”, I called as sensitively and as non-condescendingly as I could, “what are you talking about.” “Don’t condescend me, she shouted”, “we can never afford that much!” “But darling we didn’t call him, he came here by mistake and we don’t have a swimming pool or Jacuzzi and our garden lights are wired perfectly alright.”

The third reality check of the day and it dawned on my wife that with all the work we had been doing in our new house the price quotations had blurred into one.

“Shouldn’t have answered the door to him, should you!” And with that I left it.

Well not really because I wanted to find out who had the garden with the pool and Jacuzzi. I called Yitz and explained that we may be sinking a pool in our garden and wanted to see how this guys garden was laid out. We made an appointment and I met Yitz outside the house.

“Now listen,” Yitz ordered, “whatever you see, you tell the husband its great and tell the wife that you could never afford this type of luxury, that way everybody will be happy.”

We went up the drive careful not to scratch the jaguar sports car through the house past the 1000 inch LCD (ok but it was big), tripping over the video games, and numerous DVDs, peeking into to his computer room with twin monitors, and the biggest speakers you have ever seen, on past his football hall of fame room lined with shirts, signed footballs and pictures and finally into his Chinese landscaped garden.

“Oh my G…….this is amazing,” I said. He Glowed. “But I could never afford this luxury.” She glowed.

After we left I commented that at 25,000 a time Yitz must be doing very well. So he told me his own story.

“This area is predominantly populated by the 30-40 something age group, in any event all headed for that mid-life crisis. The men want to freak out but also justify it to their wives, and that’s where I fit in. I am what you might call a mid-life crisis contractor. The men come and tell me they want a pool or Jacuzzi or turn their house into something Bill Gates would b jealous of and I work out a scheme and then tell the wives that it’s the height of luxury, something their neighbors would be jealous of”. “Something that makes their bums look small in,” I interjected. “Yep, that sort of thing. See its that Israeli rosh that makes this country so great and breeds entrepreneurs like me. The men get what they want and settle down, the wives get what they want and suddenly have more dinner guests and everyone’s happy, genius!”

“So how many have you done?” I asked “Er, this is the first but its going to be a great business.”

After seeing the results of two men’s crisis’s I wondered if I would bother having after all.

I came home and sat in front of my very inadequately looking TV and just mentioned to my wife, in passing, that it would be the height of luxury and we would be the envy of our neighbors if we bought a bigger TV.

The look I got said it all.