How to Fix Up Your Family and Friends

Here are simple actions that anyone, at any age, can take to help spread romance in the world.

1. Invite people over: Right before starting college, the little gathering I threw in my parents’ Midwest basement was immortalized forever when two girlfriends, Nancy and Suzanne, met the guys they ended up marrying. You can use July 4 or Labor Day as an excuse for a casual barbecue or picnic. Or plan around Christmas or Hanukkah for a game night or mixer at your place. If you’re broke, make it a potluck. If your place is too small, meet at a local restaurant.

2. Start an ongoing professional group: Hosting a weekly writing workshop in my Manhattan living room, three couples wound up together – adding three kids to the planet, one named Esme Johanna (after Salinger and Bob Dylan characters). Another member named Bennett came, then met his husband on the walk home, another couple I claim credit for too.

3. Set up a double date: When my brother came to New York to celebrate finishing medical school, my boyfriend and I got extra tickets to a Broadway show for him and a coworker of mine who had switched to nursing school. They’re now married with four amazing children, so one fix up inadvertently added to my own family tree.

4. Bring available guests with you: When another boss — who’d complained about being single after her divorce — was throwing a brunch at her home, I asked her what to bring. She said, “single men.” I came with two unmarried gentlemen of the right age, one she wound up dating.

5. Hand a potential suitor a phone number: After Valerie shared my contact info with Charlie, he called, we went out, and six years later she danced at our wedding. So I was happy to pay it forward and share the digits of my favorite editor Danielle with Todd, a single buddy of my husband (with her permission, of course). It was a good sign when they both emailed to thank me the next day. They recently celebrated their 20th anniversary.

6. Plan special singles events: One night I hosted a book launch for my breakup memoir with the invitation “Bring an Ex — for Just Desserts,” serving champagne and chocolate, suggesting each guest come with an old flame who was now unattached. On Valentine’s Day, I sponsored a reading about love gone wrong. And when my college roommate Karen wanted to throw a summer soiree in our Michigan hometown, we secretly made the theme her “find a husband party.” I invited all the local guys I knew. She ended up wed to Jeff, bachelor #3 — now the father of her three offspring — one who is going to our University of Michigan alma mater.

7. Point to the past: I encouraged my long-distance colleague Michelle to reconnect with Jon, her college beau who got away. She wrote him, asking how he was doing and confessing she still thought about him. That message turned into love rematch and marriage a few decades late. I highly recommend everyone look through old yearbooks and check social media to see if the one who got away might be available to come back, for good this time.

8. Push for passion: When my physical therapist Kenan mentioned that a beautiful woman named Mirela messaged him on Facebook but was too far away in his Bosnia hometown, I suggested they FaceTime. After he fell for her on screen, I told him, “Don’t have a love affair on your iPhone. Get on a plane.” He did. Mirela, Kenan and their son now live two blocks from us and we double date — so this set up actually enhanced my own social life.

In fact, we’re all having dinner to celebrate my 30th wedding anniversary to Charlie, where I’ll silently toast my matchmaker for finding me my soulmate — and making sure I didn’t screw up.

Have you ever fixed anyone up? How did it go? Let us know in the comments below.