40 *“• Mt • july 18.20Û3
PEOPLE
▼
Dy, gevall!
Again with your kvetching?
Visit Your Jewish Fairy Godmother already
by
P at Y oung
he speaks in paragraphs, not sound bites.
But if you’re kxiking for a bumper stick
er, just let her know and she’ll come up
with one.
She doesn’t know how to tell it short,
she says with a laugh. But that’s OK
because a conversation with her is a
very rewarding experience. You’ll
come away from it feeling like you’ve
known her for years. Or perhaps it’s
the other way around. She has an
uncanny ability to get to know you
and help you find solutions to your
problems.
She is, after all, Your Jewish Fairy
Godmother.
Officially, Your Jewish Fairy Godmother
started in 2000, but it t<x>k a while for the
idea to jell and before Helen Rosenau
could devote her full attention. She had
been a manager of a consulting firm for
almost 18 years when she said to her
self, “I can’t do this anymore.”
She had creative things she
wanted to do but didn’t know exact
ly what fonn they should take. So the
Eugene resident began to write without the
worry of being published. It became part of
an exploration of her spiritual values.
In the midst of this, Rosenau found her
self involved in caretaking—first for her ex
partner and then for her parents. After six
months, she was exhausted. Needing a
mental health break, she decided not
to worry about work or her writing.
She was going to sit in the back yard,
have a glass of wine and chill out.
"And about four days later,” she recalls, "I
was sitting in the back yard staring at this big
oak tree and literally a voice in my head said,
‘www.yourjewishfairygixlmother.com.’ One of
my friends said, ‘She called you in.’ ”
And that’s what put this Jewish lesbian,
who will be in Portland on July 20, on the
path to becoming a free-lance adviser, advo
cate and ally.
S
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our Jewish Fairy Godmother is really her
alter ego. She refers to herself as a private
person who has chosen a very public per
sona. “The Gcxlmother represents all the
things that I have intuitively done for people
my entire life in terms of problem solving, net
working, emotional support and creative mar
keting ideas,” she explains.
Rosenau found a gixxl Web designer and
exactly the right artist to render her animated
portrait. She has a monthly advice column that
appears in several Jewish newspapers, and
clients from all over the country who seek her
help with problems and issues in their lives.
She offers serious services but delivers them in
a playful package.
“It’s fun, and I love it. I am curkxis about
people, and my goal is to make everyone’s life
better, one-on-one,” says Rosenau. “It is very rare
that I encixinter someone whom I can’t help."
Knowing a client’s values is critical as she
develops a strategy for each person to accom
plish goals. “There is something rewarding
about talking with people and hearing them
tell their stories," says Rosenau. “1 tend to ask a
lot of questions—it’s a very nonlinear
process—as 1 gather information about their
values and goals.”
Rosenau is in her mid-50s and draws on a
Y
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wealth of life experiences to help others. As
she puts it, “You can’t be a gixxl fairy gixlmoth-
er at age 25.”
And when people are willing to make a
change, “It’s like coming out. I see most peo
ple’s lives as a series of small and large coming-
outs,” she notes. “And my job is to help mid
wife that in a way to help them get to where
they want to be."
Her clients are gay, straight, men, women,
Jewish and non-Jewish. She definitely has a
Jewish, not to mention a queer, sensibility, but
she diK'sn’t think either gives her any signifi
cant advantage.
“The best people in the world to work with
are people who have a sense of themselves, a
sense of humor about what life throws at them
and are willing to take a shot at creating some
thing—to bounce with it if it goes into a direc
tion that can’t be predicted," she exclaims. “If 1
can help create the situation where it will
change, I love that."
However, if she’s not successful at pressing
the right levers and changing a person’s situa
tion, she finds that frustrating. "I genuinely
think there are ways that people can learn to
make their lives better and more successful,
and I am not measuring that by dollars,"
explains Rosenau. “I am measuring that by how
do you want to feel at the end of the day.” JM
HELEN R osenau dispenses her irreverent wisdom
3 p.m. July 20 at Keshet, a monthly gathering for
sexual minority Jews. Call 503-226-7079,
ext. 14, for location. Visit the godmother at
www.yourjewishfairygodmother.com.
PAT YOUNG is a Portland free-lance writer.