500 Days of Summer: Two Important Lessons for Everyone in the “Parsha”

(This post was originally written on 9/7/2009)



It takes a bachur with a tremendous amount of self confidence to admit to liking chick flicks. It takes an extra layer of confidence to admit liking chick flicks on a blog where all his male friends can verify this information and make fun of him profusely! I am comfortable declaring, loudly and proudly, that I like chick flicks! I absolutely LOVED Titanic, I thought You’ve Got Mail was amazing, and The Notebook was extremely touching. However, sometimes you see a movie that is head and shoulders above all the others. A movie that not only has a well thought out story line that the viewers can relate to, but also a message that can be taken with you long after you leave the theater. Last week my friend, Jake, and I saw 500 Days of Summer, which is undoubtedly the best chick flick I have ever seen. The messages that the movie conveys touched on two topics that always cross my mind during the shidduch hunt: 1) The “Build Up” and 2) Fate.


(Warning: Spoiler) A basic synopsis of the film is as follows: Tom is an aspiring architect who currently earns his living as a greeting card writer. Upon encountering his boss’ new secretary Summer, he discovers that the pair have plenty in common despite the fact that she’s seemingly out of his league. Before long Tom is obsessed. All he can think about is Summer. Tom believes deeply in the concept of soul mates, and he’s finally found his. Unfortunately for Tom, Summer sees true love as the stuff of fairy tales, and isn’t looking for romance. Undaunted and undeterred by Summer’s casual stance on relationships, Tom summons all of his might and courage to pursue Summer and convince her that their love is real. Through their tumultuous relationship there are many ups and downs. At the beginning they are blissfully happy, but as time goes by they fight and at one point Summer breaks down crying and says that she doesn’t think they should see each other anymore. Tom does not take this well and despite everyone’s advice to let her go, he is still adamant about winning Summer back.


Several months go by without Tom seeing Summer and he finds out that she is engaged. He becomes extremely depressed and enters a catatonic state where all he does is sleep and consume Twinkies and Jack Daniel’s whiskey. As the movie winds down the lessons of the movie become clear. At one point Tom is shown talking to his little sister, Rachel, about Summer. Rachel turns to him and says “Tom, I know you think she was the one, but I don’t. Next time you look back, I think you should look again.” Tom begins to think back on all the signs where it was obvious that Summer was not nice to him or not appreciative of him. Tom blinded himself to these hints because he BUILT HER UP in his mind to be something she wasn’t (Lesson #1).


Tom decides to try to turn his life around and removes all reminisce in his apartment that reminded him of Summer. He begins to assemble a portfolio and makes a list of architecture firms to interview at. After getting rejected one by one he goes to sit on a bench at his favorite part of the city. He’s gazing down at some of the buildings when Summer calls out to him. She is now married. Tom confesses that he now realizes that all his ideas about love were wrong. She points out that while he might have been wrong about her, she believes him to be right about love and fate. Tom tells her that he can’t believe that Summer, the girl who didn’t want to be anyone’s girlfriend, was now someone’s wife. Summer tells him that with her husband, she knew what she was never sure of with Tom: that she was in love with him and wanted to spend the rest of her life with him. She also tells Tom that if there’s no destiny, she might have easily never met her husband in a coffeehouse. She explains that she could have decided to stay in her apartment that night, or could have arrived at the coffeehouse ten minutes later, but the fact that she came at the exact time to that specific place was in fact fate (Lesson #2).


Lesson #1 – The Build Up: Tom blinded himself to the way Summer treated him and the lack of appreciation she had for him by focusing ONLY on the good times they shared and disregarding the poor way she treated him. In life, we are all guilty of the same attitude that Tom displayed. We meet a bachur/meidel who we think is “The One.” We build the person up in our minds to the point where we absolutely and undoubtedly know that we are made for each other! However, as many friends, family or outside sources can tell you, we have blinded ourselves from the real person. We don’t pay attention to the negative way this individual treats us, or the lack of interest this person takes in us. We ignore all their rudeness and mistreatment and assume that they are just having a bad day, but in fact we have built up someone in our mind who doesn’t appreciate us. We are, in a sense, chasing an illusion that we have created! I’m sure many people have been in relationships like this or had similar feelings about a particular individual. It’s important to take a step back from the fairy tale you think you live in and get feedback from friends and family about the person that we put on a pedestal and treat like a prince/princess. It’s nearly impossible to make an accurate assessment of a person when such strong emotions are involved.






Lesson #2 – Fate: Summer mentioned how she could have been anywhere else in the world, but that coffeehouse. She could have arrived just a couple minutes later and she would have never met her bashert, but it was because of “fate” that she ended up where she did when she did. Fate is a Jewish concept. It’s called hashgacha pratis, or divine providence. We often find ourselves saying “man did I luck out” or lines of similar meaning. The concept of luck is goyish. Yiddim believe that Hakadosh Baruchoo is keeping an eye out for them! We see this in many areas of life, but none is quite as remarkable as finding your bashert. In order for two people to find each other there is an almost infinite amount of variables that must fall into place. The timing must work out, they must be in the same place, they must notice one another, they must somehow end up interacting with each other, the two people must be receptive to each others remarks, they must remain in touch, etc. The amount of timing and planning that must go on for two people to meet and ultimately get married leaves no doubt in my mind that Hashem is actively involved in the shidduch process.






Summer also mentioned that she got engaged and married so quickly because she woke up one morning and just “knew” what she never felt through the many months she was with Tom. I have personally heard numerous stories of how people ultimately find each other. People have met on a train, at a Shabbos meal, on Facebook, at a job interview, etc. But one thing is for sure, when you ultimately meet your bashert…you just know! You can be dating someone for several years and have a bitter break up and then begin dating someone else and within 2 months you can have a stronger bond with that person then with your previous boyfriend/girlfriend who you’ve been seeing for years!






Conclusion: What was so powerful about 500 Days of Summer is how it accurately depicted ones’ quest for ones’ bashert. Most Hollywood movies have the same unrealistic/silly/obvious plot line: Guy meets girl, guy flirts with her, she turns him down, guy flirts some more, girl falls deeply in love with him, there are a few steamy smooching scenes, something threatens their relationship, they overcome this obstacle, they smooch some more, and BOOM…they build a bayis ne’eman together! This is not reality, rather it’s silliness that we are taught to believe at a young age. No one falls in love that way! Most of us will meet quite a few people that we THINK are our basherts. We build them up in our minds to be “The One” and the ONLY one we can ever love. Then we get our hearts broken!






One important point that the film neglected to state specifically was the following: What can one do in order to avoid the “build up” and the inevitable heartache that ensues? After all, we are distracted by so many other important issues like looks, personality, religious level, mishpacha, and what size skirt a person’s mother wears, that we have lost touch with what is really important. Some of the best advice I have ever received about what to look for in a mate came from a meidel who I was trying to set up. I asked her the typical first question: “What are you looking for?” Instead of receiving the typical answer (“I want someone who is nice, who likes to learn, but also wants to make a parnasa, who likes playing sports, and wants to make aliyah, yada yada yada) she said quite simply “Before anything, I’m looking for someone who will appreciate me for me!” I think if we keep this point in mind it will help ground us when our emotions try to take over. We can truly believe that we have found “The One”, but all we need to answer is one simple question, which is the real litmus test when determining if this person is in fact our bashert: “Does this individual appreciate me for me?”