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Show Kathleen Norris Says: Can You Do ll? Ilrll Nyi.illinlo - WNII l'nlm-. m in rVMx. J ... -c The four of them lived with great gaiety and courage and infinite adventures. By KATHLEEN NORRIS CAN you write your soldier sol-dier or sailor or marine ma-rine or airman that life is going to be wonderful for him when he comes home? Can you truthfully tell him that all is serene at home, all small frictions smoothed out, everything going well, and everyone waiting for the glorious glo-rious news of the peace that will bring him back? Are you making definite postwar plans for him, so that if he has always dreamed of being an engineer, or an airman, or a doctor, the means and the way will be ready for him? Are you watching national legislation closely, so that you can write your congressman urging the passage of this bill or asking the suppression of that? Are you out of debt, and putting bonds safely into that little deposit box at the bank, so that when he comes home he will have a little nestegg that will enable him to take a breathing spell when he is honorably honor-ably discharged from the service? A nestegg that will spare him the bitter humiliation of job hunting among the luckier fellows who had flat feet or bad eyes, and so could stay safe at home and progress in their jobs from promotion to promotion, pro-motion, while he was saving the civilization of the world? Do you write him all your petty troubles? That everyone has flu, that Papa is worried about the doc-tors's doc-tors's bill, that his wife, pretty little Betsy who cried so hard when be went away, seems to be having a pretty good time with the boys from camp; that you have to move and there isn't anywhere to go; that everyone ev-eryone hopes that this senseless war soon will be over, it won't accomplish accom-plish anything anyway, and that his old chum Tom has been made one of the bank's vice presidents, imagine imag-ine that at 31! Women actually do write letters like that. More than one heartsick, homesick, mosquito-bitten, swamp-soaked swamp-soaked boy has sent such letters to me wdth comments that ask, sometimes some-times in extremely violent terms, "what the heck?" Any woman who writes such letters let-ters belongs to the1. Fifth Column. What those boys ought to hear is that we are proud of them down to the last fiber of our minds, souls, and bodies; that cruel and aggressive aggres-sive nations must learn that they may neither torture their own peoples peo-ples nor swarm like pirates over the borders of peaceable countries, and that they our boys, are teaching them that lesson, swiftly, decisively, and God willing! for all time. That we know God IS willing, and that we believe it will be for all time, and that when the boys come back they shall have a hand in deciding de-ciding just how it shall be done. That nothing that we have to face at home, in tha way of taxes, privations, pri-vations, shortages, food stamps, shoe stamps, is anything mora than a joke compared to what they are sacrificing and risking. Or better yet, a challenge, a chance to show our fighting men that in our way we ENCLOSE A SMILE! All of us know the importance impor-tance of mail to our men on the fighting fronts. All of us know that despite whatever little sacrifices we make at home that he is making the greatest. While he is thousands thou-sands of miles away that soldier, sol-dier, sailor or marine of ours his desire for neivs of what takes place at home is a keen one. When he doesn't receive his quota of letters naturally he's apt to feel letdown. It's up to all of us to provide our servicemen ivith the news of what we are doing to safeguard safe-guard his interests at home while he is protecting ours. When we write let's not mention men-tion our petty troubles. That everyone has the flu; that Papa is worried about bills; or that the wife who cried when he left seems to be having a pretty good time since he's gone. Let's make the mail cheerful. Let him know that we're doing our utmost to see that things ivill be pretty smooth sailing when he returns. Enclose a smile; pack a lot of laughs in letters to him. You can do it! are eager to go as far as they are going. So if you are dragging along in the usual way, letting bills accumulate, accumu-late, grumbling about inconveniences, inconven-iences, not too scrupulous about a little black-marketing here and there, living up to the last cent of your income and generally a little more, then pull yourself up right now with a jerk. Whatever your income is, did it ever occur to you that you could live on exactly half of it, if you had to? This is the simple truth. Millions Mil-lions of families are living on half your income, and living respectably, too. There is a widow in my town who found herself left 15 years ago, with three children to care for on $60 a month. She never took one penny of help. She rented a one-room one-room cottage for $11 a month, and the four of them lived: oh, not easily, eas-ily, not luxuriously, but with great gaiety and courage. Today she runs a small restaurant for a good salary. Two girls are married, one has a job with the telephone company; the son is down in southern seas with the fleet. When he comes home a present from his mother and sisters is going go-ing to be a small but profitable newspaper news-paper and magazine business. The old man from whom they bought it will run it until he gets back. Then Chuck can either carry it on or sell it anyway, it's a temporary solution solu-tion of that bitter problem that cost our men such humiliation after the last war. There were men in uniform asking ask-ing you huskily for mu ley for a cup of coffee, after the last war. In England, all over Europe yes, and here, too. Some of them wore decorations; deco-rations; some were crippled. Is your boy, after this war, going to be one of them? 0 J Pack tmila in your letters! |