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Show KATHLEEN NORRIS When Enough Is Not Enough little farm, put up fruit. But now one son is married and far away, and the other stays with his grandmother grand-mother in town all week, and some week ends for schooling. I've gotten rid of the chickens, I dread company, com-pany, dread any effort. It's not menopause, no sign of that yet. My husband is a good, but a quiet man; we live well inside our income. in-come. Am I going mad in spite of myself?" This woman, like many others, thinks that this uncomfortable thing is all physical. It isn't. That's why so much of it can be lessened or obliterated entirely. It merely means, here, that her old activities, her proud usefulness and importance impor-tance in her own home, with the beauty and gaiety and ignorance and confidence of youth, are gone. But happiness, health, service, interest in life, energetic welcome of each successive morning, thankfulness thank-fulness for deep sweet sleep at night, these are all ahead. THERE IS no bugaboo more potent po-tent in destroying the happiness and security of a woman's life than the fear of what is called "the change." The "change" is that time when she feels, with the passing of youth, the loss of a good many other things as well. She has been married an unromantic number of years; 18 or 23 or 27 as the case may be. No more "reams of what her life may be are coming her way; she has got what she is go ing to get, in looks, money, husband, hus-band, home, children. There aren't going to be any more. Very often she has enough of worldly goods. But it isn't enough. Rooms full of furniture, of which she is tired, of china and beds and towels she knows by heart. She has dusted and polished and washed them all for years. A good husband Dan. But by this time whenever she speaks to him she knows exactly what he is going to answer, if he answers at all. Sometimes when a man is comfortable with his work, his home, his family, his wife, he only needs monosyllables. It isn't that he doesn't love them, but well, the surprises and expectations expec-tations are over for him, too. He's pleased with a good dinner there isn't a better cook in Madison county than Minnie. He's proud of his children the boy isn't going to set the river afire, but he's smart enough. And the girl has married ". . . married a fine fellow . . a fine fellow, and there'll be grandchildren someday. So Dad's evening conversation is comprised in a "got any more gravy there, Mom?" and, "O.K., son, be back at eleven," anu "had the radio fixed did you, Min? Fine." And this is not enough to satisfy Min. She's a plain woman now, who was once so pretty. Her clothes no longer excite her. Cooking has lost its excitements, except when there's company. She likes occasional occa-sional radio music, she likes to plan for a .rip, she likes certain visitors and she doesn't get much of any of this. So she falls into languor and blues, life loses its taste, and she convinces herself that she is going go-ing through that experience that all women have been taught to fear and dread. Men go through the same painful emotions when youth and dreams are over, and this is the moment when any flattering young woman can get hold of them. This is the time they tell the blonde office clerk that they are misunderstood at home. But Min has no such consolations. con-solations. A Tennessee 44-year-old woman wrote me: "I am frightened by a growing mental listlessness. I can't force myself to write a letter, read a book, concentrate on anything. I used to take hikes, do a lot on our |