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Show Kathleen Norris Says: What Can Parents Do About It? Boll Syndicnie. XI' Fe.tturrs. If 3 4 "Sally has twice been reported to me by school authorities as frequenting roadhouses, smoking, drinking." By KATHLEEN NORRIS u T T ' TE HEAR a great deal about parents' re-V re-V V sponsibility for juvenile juve-nile delinquency," writes Marna St. John from Seattle, ; "but net much about what and how and why and when parents can do anything about it! "Ours is a normal household of father, mother, two girls, one boy, small income, no servant, one car. My girls, 19 and 17, have jobs. Mar-i Mar-i garet makes good money in a local defense plant, Sally has a part-time j job and keeps up with her college studies. Mart is in second year high, j "Margaret is a good, quiet, pretty pret-ty girl, but she has always been 'discontented, feeling herself socially handicapped. Sally is independent, 1 pleasure-loving, not affectionate or i domestic. Mart seems to live a life i of his own; his boy friends are al- ways here, in the basement, or he I is off with them in their basements, j Incidentally we have a spacious, warm, well-lighted basement. Go to Roadhouses. "Never having had money. enough j to enable my girls to enterlain, or take their place in society, I can't : blame them for finding their pleasures pleas-ures away from home," the letter goes on. "But I feel deeply the disadvantages dis-advantages under which they have had to suffer. I am as distressed over Margaret's periods of depression depres-sion as over Sally's irresponsibility and independence. Margaret's case is serious enough to have needed medical advice; Sally has twice been reported to me by school authorities as frequenting roadhouses, road-houses, smoking, drinking. These are-terrible words to write of one's daughter, but in my anxiety to find 1 an answer to this problem I w;'I not spare myself. I have worked hard all my life, am a good cock, manager; the house is always clean and comfortable, and my husband ; is a steady, hard-working num de- voted to his family. Dul he Is some-; some-; what quiet, undemousl raiive, and j puzzled by what goes on. "I know we have failed, wi'.h a neurotic child, an unninnajv:;!!! i child, and a boy whose hncr: .-us ;:p-i ;:p-i pearto be anywhere th.-m at rvi:r,c?, I but how have we failed?" the letter let-ter ends. Well, Marna, I think perh.v;s yen j have failed as roost oi as do. ir. r..t i realising that good io.id, educ:. ;t ! fatherly and motherly .-.-mpa i .r ar-- ', not enough. We can't he n;--;: j negative in solvir-.g t!:i.; pioIVt..:i ,i j safely mora sal'-;-- fw oia c' '.- dren we have to st:-;r, j'e and wo;-;; ; and plan to ach-ve it. ; Here in this coiN':' town v, re I I live I oT'tn thh'k o tin; A i ; . l: -v and what firs. iVirdn j i; ..t I children. There wye U .;: : o, ( two boys 3sv two ,;,. : lived for t-.'.'o g-;t i-i v-: a ; rambling shaLby ray y . - '.'!:; -. . of town. They haw :::.:, : :. ecu J poor, for the father is ;;n -; (-:: uufierer and works iuy . y-' r:;.- j tently. The mother h.i. he1 :: : i the family income by f;i' M. : i dren to board. ru..:'.:; vk y;i.. ... -y making c;i kes a nd jcMy fjr t;ic Woman's Exchange. Yet hospitality and gaiety and cooperation co-operation were the rules of litis home, and love was t lie u; :r:c r -current, of it all. I have heard iv.-i;. the oldest girl, greet, calling s .'. .urs from the strawberry bed "con ie , and help me fix these plurds, and ; I'U see what Mother has tor per!" I have seen Phil and Jack as eageriy and us skilfully helping to pack a picnic lunch as any two women could. It might be only apples, buns, frankfurters, but by the time the Martins and their friends had dragged themselves to the top of some hill, or gone off in the rickety car to some beach. It tasted like nectar to them, w Games at Home. Father and mother instituted and led the games, in this house. There were guessing gantas at the table, and nobody .minded the fact that the entire meal consisted of one generous gen-erous stew fd'ed. with garden vegetables vege-tables and built armind two pounds ol' shank beef. Phyllis, the younger girl, was as expert a cook at 14 as her mother wns; everybody in the M "irt in house was bus v, and they always impressed cadcrs into help-i).;T- Thy never in:orrupt'd anything any-thing that was goe'g cm just because be-cause coin nan y came, and the votaig pocpln of my heu:.rh used to coine home to r"dr: le i h;it I hey had a--.si.-led at piiliipg the Maid in n lie m ord;:r. rat iny the M 'i r I in's r ad. ;, or p,::Mig rOotoraphs in the 7a a -a in sera ':., ks. ThM'e of die Alaidins married n-j.-l happily; in each case t tie ' v r' 1 ' ! i 1 a rt was one of 1 1 le familiar V-." i' the household. Phyllis, the "iia.'.f r. is now a UAVK, and ro-P'eys ro-P'eys en: mshi ...e.diy thai "all the 1'. . er yo: :e lo - s pro (a I games, n.,,. .. . , rIaM-;, ,,.S 11)0- a m- Vs, hidr-aed-yo-.; k with the ' ' is out. i'Jv. ry.nie loves to be d. v.vj ia' o a r' ..i , umenl s and ; . (ane- of fie Martin . - . n:ar' :ed ti.t; Imu !y, lovcJy .'' 1 ':r of a--: ol tile raidiest and ;r:d dil.'.1.-;:! f'lmihes lit town. ' l u-"d to !, i- iii,oMe P.i-e Mar-i Mar-i a . . : I'.diy on m:iny a Sat unlay 'i'.,. ': "i'-ce, (an I ( ume? Ask your r,.',::v. I'll b'.ajy two roast chick-. chick-. '.o.-. and a layer cake." j in her o n re a yaTirent home the i fdaicia-ns nod the layer cake were I ,t unh.le. "slang lood. P.ut on the I ' . i 1 1 ! tin's ! ; d a e . with laughter and j love, tea:arr ; arid competing, chal-j chal-j anj triumph all about, they ! be .me f')' .ri hir the cods. It may be too hilt; tor Marna. But how about you? It i never too early lo start. p S M rf i "Help me fix thrse plantA." |