OCR Text |
Show jj Dorothy Dix Talks WHAT SHALL A POOR GIRL DO? ij ; By DOROTHY DIX, The World's Highest Paid Woman Writer jj A young girl is engaged to a "Sam. my" who is "somewhere in Franco" fighting for his country, and she wants to know what she shall do while her fiance Is away whether she shall go about to places of amusement with other oth-er young people or mope in her home and wear the willow. "I am young," she writes. "I work hard all day and when I come home in the evening I find it very dreary and lonesome to- sit up alone, so I have been going out with some of my friends. It passes the time more quickly quick-ly and keeps me from worrying about my sweetheart who has answered the call of his country, but my parents think that for me to amuse myself in his absence is not being true to him. Many other girls are In my position. Will you tell us what we should do?" Take the Innocent pleasures of youth as they come to you, my dear. Life is not so full of sunshine that we can afford af-ford to miss a single hour of it, and those who would darken a day of your girlhood know not the crime that they commit. The most mischievous cult In the world is that which teaches us that there is some peculinr virtue in tears and grief, and that making ourselves miserable will be- accounted unto us for righteousness. These people think that they are never so fully doing their duty as when they are worrying themselves them-selves sick, and that to be morbid and melancholy shows that they have depths of character not possessed by those who "get over things." This is rank tommyrot nonsense. Worry does nothing but frazzle out your nerves and put a razor edge on your temper. Anxiety achieves nothing, noth-ing, but It makes lines in your face. Unavailing tears only dim your eyes ; and constant brooding over the danger and death that may come' to a beloved - one has no effect except to make you sick and miserable and such a gloomy , companion that everyone avoids your society. . As you say there are thousands of ; other young girls whose sweethearts have kissed them and ridden away to the Avar. What useful purpose can be served by all of these young women ' withdrawing themselves from all the pleasures of life and sitting down in solitary rooms to pine, and wait, and ' weep for their lover's return, and torture tor-ture themselves by letting their imaginations imag-inations picture the risks their men are running? Not one bullet will their tears turn aside, not one trench will their fears make safer, not one gas bomb will their despair make innocuous. They will but add needlessly to the misery that hangs over this darkened old world, and their letters, filled with gloom and apprehension as they are bound to be, will sap the courage and take the heart out of the men who get them at the front. Now women are called on as never before in the history of the world to assume a brave attitude towards life, and the biggest part of this bravery consists in keeping a smile on their faces. They cannot do this if they deliberately make themselves miserable miser-able by refusing every pleasure and pining themselves away to a shadow. The best thing that any girl can do for her Sammy is to go on and lead her normal life with courage, keep herself cheerful, and write him the jolliest letters she can pen, telling him that just as he is doing the part of a man at the front, so she is trying to do the part of a woman at home. That's the sort of a girl a man likes to think of coming back to, not a poor Lydie Languish Lan-guish creature who has fretted herself her-self into a case of nervous prostration. As for the danger of a girl not remaining re-maining true to her sweetheart because be-cause she goes to places of amusement where she meets other men, that is not worth considering. If a girl is so poor and weak minded and fickle as that, and has so little real love for a man that as soon as he is out of sight ho ,is out of mind, why, the sooner he gets rid of her the better. She isn't worth any real man's love, and the man who misses getting her for a wife ought to go down on his I knees and thank God for his luck. I There is no magic in a wedding ring that keeps a light and frivolous woman true and steady, and the woman who is a faithless sweetheart will make a faithless wife. As a matter of fact it would bo a good thing if every engagement could be tried out by absence, and by both the man and woman being thrown much in the society of other women and men. Then they would ind out how strong their love for each other really was, and whether they were destined de-stined for mates. If time and distance served only to make them dearer to ! each other, if. no other woman had power to charm the man, and no other ' man could make the girl's heart beat 1 quicker, then they might go ahead I with the wedding without fear for the future. I But if absence weakens the tie between be-tween a couple, and their affection is ! so fragile it cannot endure the test of association with other people, then ; Burely it is a good thing to find it out on the safe side of the altar, for divorce di-vorce is a messy thing and unpleasant to have about the premises. Personally I should not think that it would be very difficult for a girl to remain true to her Sammy, when she! compared him with the slackers who ' remain at home. Between the stalwart, stal-wart, clear eyed youth who rose up and answered "Here" to his country's call for men to defend it, and the fellow I who lets some other man fight his bat-1 tie while he escorts girls to the movies, mov-ies, or hnnds around tea, or fox trots with them, there isn't much choice for a woman who wants a real man for a husband. So don't bo afraid, girls, that it will shake your allegiance to Sammy for1 you to receive a few attentions from, other men. If you really love Sammy, and are a worth-while woman, fit to be a bravo man's wife, you will be faithful to him. And if you are of the type that prefers lounge llzzards, why, you will be doing Sammy an inestimable inestim-able favor by marrying somebody else. Of course the war will break up many engagements. For when all is said, absence is the real teat of love. Many young peoplo honestly believe that they entertain a deathless affection affec-tion for each other when all that draws them together is a physical attraction. When this is broken they have nothing in common, and they unconsciously and inevitably drift apart. Neither one is to blame. They were the playthings of nature. War has caused her to pull another tslrng on which she made1 them dance. They are separated, and find other partners, and thank Heaven that they found out in time that the impulse that the? mistook for love was not real love. Other engagements will be broken brok-en because the men who come back from war will come back changed. They will not be the same Sammies who went' away. Some of them will come back broken in body and spirit, and it will take big, strong, great hearted women to take these wrecks into their arms and nurse them back to manhood again. Other Sammies who went into the war gay and laughing boys will come out sober, serious minded men, older than their years, and they may not want for wives the silly, frivolous little lit-tle girls who were the Ideals of their callow youth. So for these, and a hundred other good reasons, I advise the girls who are engaged to soldier boys not to retire re-tire to a nunnery while their sweethearts sweet-hearts are away. And above all I entreat en-treat them not to commit the folly of becoming war brides on the theory that a marriage certificate is a certificate certifi-cate of faithfulness. It is wisest and best to keep the door of freedom open for both parties. DID YOU KNOW That a golden statue of liberty was presented to General Joffre, the hero of France, during his recent visit to America? The statue is an exact reproduction in gold of the Bartholdi statue, which was, in the year 1S8G, given by the French people to the United States and placed in the great harbor of New York. The miniature statue was modeled mod-eled and finished in the Tiffanny studio, stu-dio, New York, and the funds for the pedestal, which is of silver, was raised by the New York World. The pedestal pedes-tal stands on a polished oak block made from the flooring of the historic "Fraunces Tavern" on which Washington Washing-ton stood. A fitting gift for the great soldier of France. TWO DESSERTS Fruit Salad. With a spoon remove sections of orange and grapefruit and arrange on Individual plates. Over top place halves of Tokay grapes, a few plump raisins and small pieces of stewed prunes. Whip a little cream stiff. Add one tablespoon of sugar and one tablespoon table-spoon of any good boiled dressing. Pile on top of salad in a mound in center. Queen of Puddings. Two cups of stale bread, one-half cup sugar, two egg yolks, stirred into two cups of sweet milk. Pour over bread and bake. Spread a layer of jelly over top of pudding, add whites of eggs beaten stiff with a little sugar and return to oven to brown very I slightly. I oo |