When Ross and Dr. Emily Taylor talk about how they first met, it’s as though they are reading a scene straight out of a Jewish fairy tale.
“We were both sitting with our families during Kol Nidre services at Temple Oheb Shalom and my mom caught Ross staring at me,” recalls Emily, 30.
“I was staring at her,” confirms Ross, 32. “After services, I asked my mom who that beautiful girl across the lobby was, and before I knew what was happening, she was walking over to say hello. It was the most awkward introduction of my life, but it stuck.”
Ross and Emily exchanged phone numbers and starting dating a week later. “I had been eyeing him for years and never worked up the courage to introduce myself,” Emily says.
Now, seven years, two kids and a dog later, Ross and Emily couldn’t imagine life any other way.
“Our relationship has been incredibly easy from the start,” says Emily, a clinical audiologist who owns the Taylor Listening Center. “We’d both been in past relationships, and I think you don’t realize what a good relationship is until you’re in one.”
The couple, who’ve been married for 5½ years, have gone through a handful of life changes together, from the opening of Emily’s private practice to their move from Canton to Pikesville. But the biggest change has been becoming parents to their now 2-year-old twins, Ava and Simon.
“Emily is an incredible mother,” says Ross, a real estate developer in his family business, Taylor Property Group. “We don’t have to have a lot of discussion about parenting style. We are immediately on the same page when it comes to what we should be doing with our kids.”
Adds Emily: “Ross is a hands-on dad. He makes us a priority and tries to be home every night so we can have dinner as a family.”
Having a strong family unit is a value Emily and Ross bonded over quickly. Both are born and raised in Baltimore, spend a lot of time with their extended families and say the “Jewish culture and community play a big role in the way we parent.”
“Our kids go to preschool at Beth Tfiloh and learn all about the Jewish holidays so we make sure we are celebrating those and providing them with a nice Jewish home,” says Emily. “Shabbat is a big one for us and we have dinner with family every week.”
While spending quality family time is important, Ross and Emily say making time for one another is equally as important and they strive to create that balance.
“You have to put in the effort to make your spouse a top priority,” says Ross. “The desire to put in that effort should come naturally. From the very beginning of our relationship, we were both instantly happy being together and we both wanted to be together.”
As the couple reminisces about the start of their relationship and think about how they have grown, they recognize how grateful they are that their moms played “Jewish mother” roles to bring them together.
“Every Kol Nidre, I thank my mom for noticing Ross awkwardly staring at me,” says Emily. “When you have the approval of your family, it makes life that much easier.”
Filmmaker Justin Schein looks at wealth and inequality through the very real story of his late father.
This year’s Community Block Party at the JCC of Greater Baltimore will feature classic cars, giant inflatables, games, a rock-climbing wall and roller skating rink, and strolling entertainers.
For 35 years, the late Deborah Brodie, aka Bubbie Cookie, amassed a collection of over 200 Jewish ritual objects, which she used to teach her Hebrew school students with special needs.
In a recent talk at Beth Tfiloh, Elisha Wiesel called on Jews to cultivate joyfulness in their faith and sense of community.