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Show Kathleen Norris Says: A Plan for Father's Day BeU Syndicate. WNU Features. i , . I "Dad, Sis and Treally need a little money. She's still paying for her ur . and we got our hats last week." MAKE IT HIS DAY! During these war days Father Fa-ther is the forgotten man, even more than usual. He has to meet higher expenses with the same salary; he must buy war bonds, and contribute to the Red Cross and all that. Now that his son is gone into service, he feels lonely and depressed, for he knows the hardships of military life, and its dangers. The son who was his pride and hope is gone, at least for the time being, and Father) can't say anything. Mothers get the sympathy, but Fathers are supposed to be strong and silent. So on this Father's day, Miss Norris suggests the family, fam-ily, that is mother and the girls let up on their constant pleas and hints for money, and let Dad have a little peace of mind. The day should be given over to making Father comfortable getting his pipe and slippers, preparing his favorite fa-vorite dishes, and letting him have the car. These attentions' will please him a lot more than a party, or an expensive present. doesn't come back, and anything happens to him, to Dad himself, it'll be hard going for Hatty and the girls. However, whenever he says a word to Hatty about trying to catch up, she and the girls simply go crazy. Does he mean the few servicemen they have in now and then for dinner, and Betty's new suit and buying a second-hand car? Good gracious, isn't it enough to have Bill overseas and not helping out with expenses any more, and food and everything else just about doubled in price, and Mother and Sis so tired every night that if they can get Mrs. Moore to come in and clean up goodness knows that they ought tofeel free to do it! What do a few bills matter when any day they may have the news of something some-thing happening to Bill, and half the families they know are in mourning! Time for Economy. Dad knows they are all wrong, that this is the time to shorten sail and get every household in the union into shape for the coming changes and crises, but he can't argue three women down, so he retires to his radio and his newspaper, and hears the murmurs from the women in the dining room. "What's the matter with him lately?" late-ly?" his daughters ask cautiously as they press frills or pin up curls. "He's so cross. Mother, you ask him if we can't go to the lake with the gang for the week-end. Tell him it's really to amuse the boys from camp. About five dollars each, isn't it, Sis?" So Betty comes in and asks him if he's tired, arranging her pretty curls in the mirror while she talks, and finally dares break into it boldly "Dad, Sis and I really need a little money. She's still paying for her fur, and we got our hats last week, but this week-end " By KATHLEEN NORRIS BY A PLAN for Father's day I don't mean asking ask-ing the Cousin Willys to dinner and having strawberry ice cream for dessert, or even having his chair covered as a surprise. I mean that every family shall make a plan that immediately im-mediately concerns father's comfort and security. Because Be-cause while my heart is aching ach-ing now for practically everyone every-one in the world, it really does ache especially for fathers. Mothers, I may say in a hurried hur-ried aside, are more resourceful, resource-ful, more independent, and more able to heal the wounds of change and absence than fathers are. Twenty million women in America, young wives and old, are doing things they never dreamed of doing three years ago. Whereas for twenty million fathers fa-thers life is unchanged, except that the office routine is harder; there is an empty place at the dinner table; expenses are higher, and everything ev-erything he once hoped to make certain cer-tain and sure for his loved ones has been torn up by the roots. Most wives don't realize HOW HARD LIFE IS FOR FATHER. In thousands of households he is taken for granted. Of course his place is set at the table and if there's a girl in the family he isn't expected to help with the dishes, but too many times life in the household goes on with almost no reference to him at all. He is there, the good man who gets unreasonably cross sometimes and has to be soothed, even at the cost of truth, who is allowed to read the paper before anyone else at breakfast, and who hands out money for everything. One Man Bank Meets Appeals. "Daddy, how about my five? How about my allowance? Tom's shoes, dear. The plumber, Dad. The man was here again about the garden, hadn't we better tell him to go ahead? Dad, you said you'd pay me it's the Community Chest, dear, the Red Cross, it's Betty and the Scouts, darling, it's your sister's anniversary it's Saturday, and we told them they could go to the movies, I'd like to make a payment to the dentist; we have to have hats. Dad." Dad plods along, year in and year out. In these days he travels in packed trains, crowds his way into busses. He's getting older and he's getting nowhere, fast. Sis is making money at the rationing board; Mother Moth-er chatters of her nursing course good, all good. But he had dreams, long ago, of retiring some day, of having a little farm and maybe a few chickens and a pup too bad to go on paying rent all this time. Some fellers own their homes and have an apartment or, two to rent, besides. Baker and Miller have about the same pay as Dad, but their wives have everything all cleaned up, no bills, war-bonds salted down in the bank well, a man must sleep better bet-ter when his family stands back of him like that. The boy will come back from Italy of course, and they'll all pull out of this mess, but sometimes some-times he thinks that if young Bill ftW I Makt him comfortable ... ' |