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Show Kathleen Norris Says: Breaking a Soldiers Heart Bel Syndicate. WNU Feature. nd tee me ajra in if Marylin end I or reconciled. What thall I do? I feel like I have no home, no family and no friends." By KATHLEEN NORRIS EVERY woman, ir the next tremendous years ' of our country's history, is going to be either a taker or a giver. Every old, old woman, with the end of her labors and. the quiet of death in sight, and every very young woman ten, twelve, seventeen seven-teen years old, must put herself her-self into the class of the takers or that of the givers. We have come of age in the last terrible years, we Americans. We begin to see the great future that opens before us, a future in which the nations of the world shall all be friends, shall be speaking, as it were, the same language, thall solve together the age-old problems of want and excess, bitter need and . extravagance, inflated currency, depressed de-pressed currency, overproduction, underproduction. But this glorious future, that thall remake the whole history of man, will not be reached without acts of separate and Individual heroism on your part and mine. It cannot be reached without our determination to achieve it It is there the glorious glori-ous tomorrow, without fear, without with-out poverty, without war. But the statesmen and diplomats and soldiers sol-diers who are at the top of all our governments cannot accomplish it It is only the people, ourselves, who can do that Hence it is needful for every woman in the world this summer morning to look her own circumstances, circum-stances, her own conduct, severely in the eye, and decide Just where she falls short. Just how much is she helping her neighbors to become be-come loyal and useful Americans? Just what sum of 'happiness, security, se-curity, service is she rendering to her own people? 'Devil of a Mess.' Here is a letter that gives the dark side of the picture, I quote It only in part "I've come home," writes Pvt. Bates McVayne, "to a devil of a mess. Maybe my nerves are still shaken from a pretty rotten time in the Pacific. Well, anyway, when I left two years ago our kid was three days old. It was like death to part with them, but the arrangement arrange-ment was that Marylin and the baby were to live with my mother and sisters, and everything was going go-ing to be swell. "Marylin and the girls quarrelled, and Marylin took the baby and went and lived with a woman friend. Here the bnby was so neglected that my mother went and got her one dry and brought charges against my wife, in court' Marylin then went to live with a man she'd met and fallen in love with, and is still there, and the baby too. The baby seems happy, and doesn't know me, of course, and Marylin wants a divorce, but the man she is with wants me to pay for it as he thinks charges of complicity or alienation of affection could be brought against him if he pays for it Marylin says she will come back to me if I say so, as she feels she treated me badly. My mother and sisters say they will not see me again if Marylin and I are reconciled. recon-ciled. What thaU I do? I feel like I have no home, no family and no friends." There is a warm welcome home Cet hold of the little firL . . , BITTER HOMECOMING Probably not many returning return-ing soldiers will find as unhappy unhap-py a situation at home as Bates McVayne did, but there is a lot of heartbreak ahead for many poor , fellows. His wife was wrong, of course, to live with another man while her husband hus-band was away fighting, but she is trying to make amends. It's his mother and sisters who are making a bad situation worse. They have told Bates that they will never speak to him again if he takes his wife back! There's a little daughter in the picture, too. Bates would like to have her, in any case. She was only a few days old when he left, and does not remember re-member her father, of course. Then there is the other man. He wants Bates to give Marylin Mary-lin a divorce, and to pay for it too! This maddening mess is a soldier's homecoming "present." "pres-ent." ul feel," Bates writes, "like I have no home, no family fam-ily and no friends." for a tired soldier! I am advising Bates to wait; to get hold of his little girl and take her to hit mother for a long visit, this without antagonizing antag-onizing Marylin or anyone else. Under the circumstances he will have no trouble in getting hold of the child. His sisters will probably be especially gracious with this ar-rangement, ar-rangement, and time to cool off and view tne situation dispassionately will be given everyone. Such Women Are No Help. But what takers these five women wom-en are, and how far from their conception con-ception of things is the idea of giving! Giving help, hospitality, friendship, giving service, cooperation, coopera-tion, comfort. Their letters to Bates might have been family chronicles full of content, family gossip, cheering cheer-ing reports, hopeful plans. They might have made it Impossible for him to forget that he is loved, needed, missed every hour. Instead they have regaled him on petty suspicions, quarrels, scandals, law suits. He has been tormented by anxieties for his child, regret for his mother's distress, resentment at the infidelity of his wife. If America and the world are ever to emerge from today's terrible ter-rible shadow of war, it will not be through women like these that they will be saved. We never can solve national and International problems while our own lives are a confusion of discontents, debts, doubts, idleness, idle-ness, indifference, selfishness. We need strong doses of the old fashioned fash-ioned virtues of faith, hope and charity. Charity toward starving China, of course, stricken Europe, of course, the claims of the Red Cross, the War Chests, the homes and aides and drives and institutions, institu-tions, of course. But faith and hopo and charity first of all for our own people the people with whom we have breakfast, and for whom we set the dinner table at night. If each of us plants the three cardinal virtues vir-tues in the home circle, the world will one Jay become one great home circle and very close to the Kingdom of God. |