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Show I Kathleen Norris Says: Time: The Inevitable Cure ; Bell Syndicate. WNTJ Features. When your soldier boy comes home, remember that time is the cure for the problems that will come with him. By KATHLEEN NORRIS WHEN your soldier boy comes home, remember remem-ber that time is the cure for the problems that will come with him. Whatever the situation is, time will alleviate its hardest features; time will bring new interests, new turns of the wheel that will make living tolerable to him. Be infinitely patient; not too cheerful, not too sympathetic. Keep about him as pleasant an atmosphere as you can, and wait for time. Perhaps he may have to adjust ad-just himself to the loss of a hand, or a leg. Perhaps his sight is gone. Perhaps some facial injury will cause him oain and difficulty for the rest of his days. Or perhaps and this is the most dreadful of all his mind will be slightly disordered. Not enough to make him an institution case, but enough to distress those who love him, depress him almost to despair, des-pair, and make readjustment slow and hard. Meet all this with serenity and faith. Time works miracles. Torn ligaments heal; lost limbs are missed much less than anyone un-afflicted un-afflicted by that loss can believe. And love and courage anoV time time time build up ruins ;and tie the scattered threads of life into new patterns. After the Parties. So when your soldier boy comes home, meet him with the usual royal welcome. Fried chicken and layer cakes, joyous telephoning and visiting, presents, entertainments, unlimited family affection and interest. in-terest. But when this flurry Is over, the strain comes, and that Is the moment mo-ment when you have to have your strength and philosophy ready. Here is the story of an American mother who has had that crisis to face. e "My twin sons, Rafael and Raoul, went into the service in the army two years ago." writes Mrs. Frank Espinosa of Tucson, Ariz. For a while they were together, then Rafe was. sent to the Marianas, from which he returned six months ago, having lost both legs. Roily is still in this country. "The mass horrors of war are beyond be-yond all comprehension, but surely there is no sadder case than that of a magnificent 22-year-old who comes home hopelessly crippled. His father aged 20 years overnight, and for all my prayers, all my determination, de-termination, I could hardly bear the shock of meeting him. "In his wheel chair, he held a sort of travesty of homecoming reception; re-ception; then we had to 'face the grim fact put away forever the old fishing-rod, the football clothes. The pity of friends and family cut him terribly, yet he had to see people. peo-ple. We are not rich, my husband's salary is adequate, but no more. Our home is a six room cottage. In a plain block of similar cottages. The boys used to go away camping in hot weather, and for several seasons, sea-sons, my husband took a job in a mountain hotel, and I went there with him, and helped in the dining room. But we could afford no luxuries luxu-ries for our stricken boy. We could not take him away from the eyes of neighbors and friends. "For months he sat and brooded. S II 1 r iwy . mA look I thought never to see again." THE ROAD BACK Families of war veterans will have to put up with a period of reorientation, while the young man struggles to readjust read-just himself to the old ways of life. Whether this trying time is long or short depends a good deal on the man's character, char-acter, and on the experiences he has endured. A soldier who faced death for many months will have a harder course than one who served as a clerk, far from danger. Then too, the problem is frequently complicated by wounds, loss of limbs or senses, or by mental disturbances. The sense of helplessness is especially espe-cially oppressive to a sensitive sensi-tive young man who has always al-ways been strong and active. Mothers, sisters, siveethearts, in fact everyone associated ivith these unfortunate fellows will have to make a constant effort to help them back to a cheerful cheer-ful viewpoint. How one soldier regained his happy outlook is recounted recount-ed by Miss Norris in today's article. He is only 22, but he has to face the future without legs. Yet in time he found new interests woodcarving, helping help-ing with the family cooking, caring for a few chickens and a dog. Simple, homely things, but they are often the best cure for the aftermath of war. He would try to brighten my poor boy! he could not do it. Rafe came home, and was happily married last June. Maria, my daughter-in-law, generously agreed to a quiet wedding in our parlor, so that Roily could be present, but Roily would not be best man. It was all sadness, darkness, hopelessness hopeless-ness for the three of us at home. Carved Wooden Dolls. "Then I hardly know how, things changed. For one thing, we bought him a dozen chickens, and it is extraordinary ex-traordinary how they amuse and interest in-terest him. For another, I let him help me with cooking and got him a little cook book. Now he asks me to get taragon vinegar or maraschino mara-schino cherries for various dishes, and putters away with chopping bowls and egg-beaters while I am getting meals. "Best of all, he carved me a little Scotty out of soap one day, and it was so good that I have kept it, under a glass bowl, and have encouraged en-couraged him to carve other thing3. Now he is carving the most remarkable remark-able jointed dolls of white wood; they are so fine in their natural little childish faces and forms that he has not only found an immediate market mar-ket for the few he has done, but may really hope for a fine livelihood liveli-hood from them. This still seems to my husband and me too good to be true, but it is surely coming. "Lastly, two weeks ago, to celebrate cele-brate the first little success of the dolls, we brought him a baby Scotty, Scot-ty, a little mass of bouncing black wool, and a few hours later, when Brig was asleep in Rolly's arm, I saw a look on Rolly's face that I thought never would be there again. "In gratitude to God," this letter ends, "my husband and Roily and I send you his story, to encourage other mothers to be patient, and to believe that things will be better in time." Keeping Knives Sharp Most kitchen knives get dull because be-cause they are improperly stored, used for the wrong job, and never properly sharpened. To sharpen paring par-ing knives put a sharpening stone on a flat surface, pour on a few drops of light or medium household oil, and, holding the knife in your right hand, with your left forefinger bearing down slightly on the knife tip, 1 "shave" the stone first toward you, , then away from you. The knife is horizontal to the stone throughout the sharpening process. |