Evening star., 1901-08-24
SATISFIED WITH HIS LOT


square-Jawed man on the rear seat of the
lexington car pointing to the bottom OF
his newspaper with his spectacle case,
that's full ofClow, keart-wringing. sobful
walls In almost every line about the
writer's lost youth, land his bright days
that are no more and the 'vistas OF his
youthful days that've so sadly disap-
peared, and the -sleaping blood that once
pranced through his VEINS. and he follows
this UP with wild plants about the impossi-
bility Of his getting another whack at the
game of youth, and pictures the state OF
joy that he'd find himself in il he could only
wake up and find that it was only bad
dream about his glad youth having drib-
bied away from him-and heap more
along the same line
There are heap Of PONIES like enat,
went on the square-jawed man, and l
never wade through one OF em that
aont picture the writer OF ia 70 t, Dc oss aos.
different kinds of an Ananias than ever
practiced fakeology through the medium OF
pen and an inkpot. That Is to say, II
the writer Of a bundle Of misleading WORDS
OF this sort really Is a middie-aged per
son, and one. therefore. whose youth is
inevitably lost as they call II. for they
tell me that quite considerable NUMBER
of long-haired youths, fully nineteen years
OF age, and consequently IN the eia,ns naoun.Jala
Byronic stage of existence, sit themselves
down and gnaw on their fanclfui woes py
writing lost youth doggerel But II any
actually middle-aged human being orags
his chair up to a writing table and squats
himself down for the purpose OF scrip-
bling these lamentations over the pfaVe
days when he was twenty-one,. ana All
that. then he must simply be precise ana
practiced liar. badly in need or suD)ect.
i've talked this thing over with lot O
cronies of my own age-and I'm enough pc
yond seven to remember the days OF ga
guerreotypes-and every one OF them shllie4
r14r sIo el. Nty
asked him fatty if he'd care to live II all
over again. The man who climbs through
this queer old scramble that's caHeo the
game Of living, and reaches an age Wnere
not much Of anything bothers or excltes
him-an age that enables him 10 perceive
how little, after all, anything counts-ex-
periences feeling of too much sel1-sa1ls-
faction ever to want to have chance 10
repeat his days They're too hard to live,
son, most of en-
"Dye spose that any sane and truthiul
middle-aged man would care to repeat the
sorrows of 'blighted affection and all the
kindred agonies of the moon-calf that most
of us go up against before we go TO the
altar with the girl. that's alongside OF us
to cheer the days of our advancing years!
The hopeless, pleading letters sent ana re-
ceiyed the little returned bundles Of pres
ents, the -pulp-headed thoughts or the DARK
river carrying our loye-Wrecked carcaSses
out to sea-say, dye S.poSe tnat any Oh US
old codgers would care to go through the
acute, soggy despair of all that sort OF
thing that is SO peculiar to our alleged
glorious salad days? l wot not
How dye s'pose the fogies among US
who've had a pretty craggy time OF 1t IN
endeavoring to salt something away for
the less strenuous years-how dye s'pose
we'd like to again tackle the JOB OF scuf-
fling out of debt or of paying all over again
for those carloads and cartioads OF Iur-
niture or of tagging along in proper pace
with the building and loan association!
Would the backward. turn backward, On
Time in thy flight stunt compensate US for
the dreary days and nights we've hung
over the precarious bedSides of suffering
children or for the occasions when most
of us have stood beside open graves, with
shadows thick around us that 1t was all
one whether we ever sat down at another
meal or not? s. ~
son. this little old state Of calm. Of
observation-disclosures that only comes along
, and wraps uss round when we've gained
years is too good to be exchanged for the
heats the tempers, the RACES, the worries
, the griefs that areT almost an inevitable
and necessary portion Of youth that Is
neveri SO smooth and free. $50
Does the climbersfWh stands upon one
of the high tables of the mountain and
looks over the1 sunlH valley, so to speak,
with a contented, if not an actually VIC
torious, mind-adoes he envy the fellow
who's just crossing the ford at the bottom
Of the altitude and has got the whole peril
ous discouraging. 1aborieus job in front OF
him? 81 sa
May, not, my boy The folks who have
got through It, all are the real winners
not the overly chesty lads who view the
men and women that've accomplished their
task as unfortunates. tes ..,eT
'.If Time ever takes 1t into his old head
to turn backward in his flight I'm going to
put in q petition to have him leave me out
Of the general reversal. Enough's enough,
and come pretty near to knowing when