The Trap of the "Perfect Résumé"

"When you enter the shidduch world, your life turns into a PDF file. My résumé was put together by my mother together with an experienced shadchanit. Everything in it is perfect: the right school, the family's reputation, recommendations from well-known rabbis, a description of my character ("modest, quiet, loves to cook").

Recently I was sent the profile of a guy from Boston. On paper — a prince. We met in a hotel lobby. For the first twenty minutes he was literally checking me off against a list! He asked why my profile said I knew Hebrew at a basic level rather than an advanced one, and whether I really planned to put my career on hold to raise children, the way my mother had written. I sat there feeling like I was being interviewed for a junior manager position, not on a date. When I tried to joke and tell a funny story from college, he tensed up and asked: "That wasn't in your profile description, was it?" We parted ways an hour later. I came home, opened that cursed PDF file, and cried. The system had turned me into a perfect product, but the guy was looking for a set of specs, not a living girl."