



I introduced my boyfriend, Ferdy, to my parents 25 years ago when he and I stayed at their home in Millbrook, N.Y. He was visiting from Bali, Indonesia, where we had met and fallen in love three years earlier. I was on break from teaching in Hong Kong, the city to which I had escaped from midlife crises of divorce and despair.

When my Hong Kong contract ended, I moved back to New York, but Ferdy and I faced substantial hurdles in getting him a tourist visa. Finally, 18 months later, I was able to pick him up at Newark Liberty International Airport and we drove to my apartment in Staten Island, near the college where I was teaching.

We kept each other warm in my apartment but braved winter during my time off so I could show him my city: Central Park, the Cloisters, MoMA, the Village. And we planned a weekend visit to my parents’ house in Millbrook.

“What will your friend eat?” my mother asked on the phone.

“Whatever you make,” I said. “But maybe rice instead of potatoes.”