The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1905-03-08
NEAT WOMAN MAKES
LIFE A BURDEN
Paper UnfOlded or a Chair Out
of Line Makes Her
Miserable

Perhaps next to nagging a man VIII
suffer most from overneatnesS which
sadly affiicts some women (this is
series on the Sorrows of Husbands.
Absolute disorder and no regard for
neatness at all is, in it's liability to
produce discomfort, about the only
thing worse than neatness carried to
a craze. The person who has no order
in her soul, for whom time does not
exist and who never can catch up with
eXents-eVen the petty affairs OF
everyday living-is a real trial to those
who must live with her. (She is not
always her" let it be said in paren-
home by being unduly thoughtlesS or
angelic visitation would make Or
derly) -
To most of us home is place where
we can do as we please. By that it
is not meant that we want to do queer
things, or to abuse the privileges of
theses. for there are men whom only an
discourteous. But at the same time
home, to man. is the one spot where
he can. relax, throw a paper on the
floor, or leave a book open on the ia
bic and smoke when he feels like 1t.
The amenities of life prevent his doing
just as he would want to in other
peoples houses. Now many of these
things which make home to us are
flowned upon by the woman with an
overneat soul She is what someone
called "pisen neat"
When a man returns home at night
with the pleasant anticipate of slip
pers and pipe. not to mention an
easy chair and the latest magazines,
he is in a mood to take life easily and
not bother about things. But if his
wife is one of the oyerneat kind he
Will not have the nice time he was ex-
pecting. If he smokes a cigar and the
ashes happen to drop on the carpet,
whew! what a lecture he will get.
Then If he bends some book cover back
1T is the signal for another attack.
Perhaps he has put two or three chairs
{ out of line and left them awry. Trou-
! BILE again. Perhaps the neat wife
learns after a time that it is tactless to
, scold tired man and she decides to
say no more. But the neatness within
Aher is not easily overcome, and IL he
Throws a paper on the table she will
Erise quietly and fold it up without say
ting word. But after she has done
this a number of times her husband
Twill say word, just one word, and it
viii be a bad one.
A chair out of place will nearly give
the neat woman fit; a paper on the
FLOOR will throw her into spasms and
mud tracked into the house will almost
give her fit of sickness. Once the
writer knew a neat woman on this or
der; if she found a speck on the car
pet she would not put it in the scrap
basket, but would walk solemnly to
the window. raise it and throw it out
side. Neatness had become part of her
blood and she could not help it. Her
husband, through association and
force of habit, had become almost as
neat as herself. But alas, this old lady
had married sons whose wives did not
take neatness as seriously as she, con-
.sequently there was not very much
visiting back and forth.
There was once another woman who
was so neat that she hated to have the
ordinary affairs of the house going on
because some things had to be taken
out and used. She was happiest when
absolute quiet reigned, the sweeping
and busting was over and not even one
chair was out of place.
Order and a longing for it is one of
the attributes of great mind, but a
petty kind of neatness, when a speck
or dust can cause torture, is a sign of
a small soul. The mind which is con-
sumed with keeping chairs at a GER
tain angle and can allow itself to suf-
Ter untiid agony over a dusty book is
not mind of the highest or most gem
erous nature. Many a man has been
driven from home by this very thing
he must sit up straight in his chair
1cok at one paper at a time and fold
IL up carefully when he has finished IL
and conform in other ways to regula-
tons set forth by the wife who con-
sloegS heatness above comfort. 1t is
possible to be neat and comfortable
too, but this refers to the woman who
Is too neat, and who regards it as far
above her husbands comfort in value
There is now and then a man who has
this disease himself, but-well, he is
not ike. other girls! The kind of neat
ness complained of here is that which
makes a slave of a woman and domi-
mates her. instead of being one factor
IN well rounded character.