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Show Kathleen Norris Says: You Have to Take Something Bell Syndicate. WNU Features. A II II vlllW "Be happy. Accept the dark uikh the bright, and rejoice if you can lift your problems up and out of the great national sum of trouble." By KATHLEEN NORRIS THERE is not a woman in the length and breadth of America, at this moment, mo-ment, who is not putting up with some circumstance that is almost unendurable. The world, for many years, has been very sick. We bore up pretty well when the fever was high and the symptoms so dangerous that it seemed as if we mightn't recover; now we're in for the trying, exacting, pettish, quarrelsome, quarrel-some, bored, tedious time of convalescence, and it's going to take whatever we can muster mus-ter of courage and character. Young wives with small babies are absolute slaves these days, either tackling the herculean jobs of dishes and dldies, playtime and mealtime, marketing and"cooking, beds and dust, telephone and nose colds all by themselves, or paying a good round dollar an hour for not too effectual ef-fectual help. Mothers and fathers of boys just back from service are learning, with heartache, how deep the world-poisoning world-poisoning penetrated into the young hearts, how hard it is for the boys to take up civilian Jobs, to fit themselves them-selves quietly into civilized living again. Everyone is Worried. Doctors are overworked to the dropping point. Business managers are harassed by the irreconcilable margins between ceiling prices and rising wages. Strikes are darkening thousands of households. Hospitals are full of physically wounded boys struggling back to life and to usefulness, use-fulness, and of boys more seriously wounded wounded . in soul and mind, who in puzzlement and darkness dark-ness must somehow work their way toward the light. So for eoodness sake pick up your own share and carry it, and make light of it, and help us all get through! Don't complain that your husband never praises you, or that he doesn't tell you about his business, or keeps you short of money, or takes an interest in other women, or talks rudely to you when he's had a drop too much, or does or doesn't do a thousand other things that nag at you like midges all day and keep you from being happy. Be happy. Accept the dark with the bright, and rejoice if you can j lift your problems up and out j of the great national sum total of I trouble, and establish a household financially sound, affectionate, capa- ble, harmonious. We need a million of them we need 10 million we could use 40 million. If 10 million women suddenly waked up to their blessings, decided to ignore their trials or disadvantages disadvan-tages or privations or unsatisfied desires, decided to shoulder the load i and go straight ahead uncomplain-! uncomplain-! ing toward the goal of prosperity and happiness that is right ahead of us how much faster we'd reach it! Gloomy Grandma. Betty Van, for example. Betty is all hot and bothered because Van's mother lives with them. Betty has babie, aged five and three, and eight months. ... "She is wonderful with the children," chil-dren," writes Betty, "and of course does lot in the kitchen, and hon-j hon-j estly I think I could be fond of her ; mmx :r ' '- - --- 3 J Fktfk. j"SA talks oj tick-beds and sorrows. " LAUGH OFF TROUBLES Practically every woman in the country has to endure some difficulty. Sometimes it is a little thing, like a small, crowded apartment, or lack of help. Or it may be a crushing burden, like a mentally or physically sick husband, who has been ruined by war. There is a tension everywhere, a sense of bitterness among large groups, of frustration and disillusionment. dis-illusionment. Women who have only minor troubles should count themselves among the blessed. Betty Van, for example, has almost everything; a good home, loving husband, three children. Her husband's mother moth-er lives with them, and helps a lot in the kitchen and with the children. This is all splendid, splen-did, except that the old lady has a sad outlook on life. She wants to tell dreary tales of sickness and death, hardships and accidents. Betty is afraid she ivill depress the children, and make them morbid and neurotic. . Miss Norris assures Betty that there is little 'danger that youngsters three to five years old will be affected by gloomy stories. The little ones cannot understand, and wouldn't care if they could. At that age they are interested only in themselves. them-selves. On the other hand, they will benefit greatly by their grandmother's care and instruction. Betty is fortunate to have such a willing and able helper, adds Miss Norris. if she wasn't so gloomy. I'm afraid it will affect the children. She wants to talk of sick-beds and sorrows sor-rows and what happened to her friends in the way of sudden death and dreadful accident, and every morning she sighs and reads Van the names in the list of deaths. Do you suppose my children will catch this dismal outlook; I am naturally natural-ly cheerful and optimistic, and so is Van, but sometimes I'm afraid she will pull us all down to her level. lev-el. And yet it would be frightfully hard to tell Granny that we wanted her to live elsewhere." ... No, Betty, it won't affect the children, and it's for you rather to cheer the old girl up with attentive Interest in her sad tales, and hopeful hope-ful comment wherever you can put it in. You have in her a devoted cook and nurse, one to whom the children's safety is dearer even than to you, and any young mother you know would envy you. We had a nurse years ago who used to take us to the nearby graveyard grave-yard and let us play there, month out and in, while she worked on a special shroud that she was eventually even-tually to wear, and that was supposed sup-posed to have some mystic merit. We took deep interest in the shroud and loved the gravestones where we played house, ship pirates, circus and everything else that suggested life and youth. It's a lucky man who has his mother under his roof, living in harmony with his wife, and keeping keep-ing a loving watch on his children. Hold on to your luck! |