The log cabin Democrat., 1910-04-12
ON NOT BEING INDEPENDENT

sidering the most interesting ideal Suppose nobody had to fuss ever try ng to be what he felt he was ex- pected to be, and could just accept himself as he wss-think of the time one would have really to enjoy life
 "Tne reason this great thought dawned on me-" explained the girl yho likes to talk, "is that when l got up this morning I felt lazy and nor tally yearned to skip my gymnastics that I sternly writhe through twice day. You see, I'm getting stout and ] realize that nothing but stern, heroic, regular slaving will help me
 "l had to argue with myself. l said | firmly: Now, you know perfectly well | that those reducing exercises won't l do you ten cents worth of good if you are haphazard about them-its the steady plugging away that counts.
 Its dreadful to think that all my 1 nfe I'll have to struggle that way, l Why. I just long for a real legitimate excuse to escape my duties. Talk l about inheriting a fortune, If I could 1 wake up some morning and know ] i - a days freedom from those gym 7astics that l loathe I'd go mad with 1 Joy. Think how lovely it would be il could just comfortably grow fat and nobody would be shocked, and I was 'ust as goodlOoking as though I wer" | thin and knew it didn't matter, Sir | ply because 1 realize the world will uink me sight if I don't attain oy tphlikeness I'm doomed to struggle l on!
 Then look at Daisy Greene, She has such a desperately pretty face that everybody says, Gracious! l ex' 0ect reople are just crazy over that ~irli She probably is the most popI lar person in her crowd and has ,ozen proposals a season. Whats the result? Why. poor Daisy, who is per Fectly simple and unassuming and 1 would far rather stay at home and rcad novels or embroider centerpieces, $ wearing out her young days being belle because the world thinks she should be, You needn't tell me that | girl isn't slave. Look at the way she races about to theaters and uncheons and dinners, She smiles smiles pcrpetually, and is always teyed up to be charming and attrac l tive-when she doesn't give a pica 1 9une for the fact that her dance pro 1 sram is filled first and the papers call } CT a social favorite.
 She's bored to pieces by it all She's just as much tied to a treac mill as 1 am with my gymnastics, and | here's no escape for her either Everybody has decided that she Ii make a brilliant marriage and be a social leader and she wouldn't dare
 or her life marry man who wanted
 O stay at home and read the nADe' ayenings and wear smoking jacket for such a howl would arise about her throwing herself away with all he, beauty and genius for the whirl of SO eiety, All because she knows what's axpected CT her and bows to public opinion.
 Consider the way Mrs. Updike vears herself out endeayoring to n'ake her daughter grow up into what buP luluhS G1dI~l OuSIll lO Dt lliS lCt'l If what Hazel naturally is, Hazel is II lumpy, ordinary young person of IA 1 who has no taste for the artistic and no gift or charm. she'd be perfectly content to be left in a corner and not bothered all the rest of her life-in fact. that's the only role shed make a success of. Yet her mother Is | nd H12nI hl q by eternally goading her on to shine
 putting her in an exclusive school tC make proper friends when she cant make friends any more than she can pick Mars out of the sky to trim 3 hat, chasing her to her French les sons, standing over her like monu ment while she tortures the piano, in sisting on her painting dreadful things. making her do clumsy antics at dancing school, keeping at he' grimly
 ''It would be pathetic i; it wasn',
 70 ridiculous, Why cant she accept
 Hazel for what Hazel naturally hi and let it go at that? Shed have lots
 more time to enjoy life and HazA
 4vould have some peace. But she iE
 taunted by the knowledge of wha
 people think a daughter ought to be
 and she'll keep at it till they both dit
 If exhaustion or till Hazel elopes witt
 grocery clerk and lives happily eve,
 after
 T feel sorry for George Edwards
 He'd be such an ideal. ladylike pro
 pretor Of a dry goods store in small
 town-and here he is trying to be {
 clubman, a cotillon leader and a sac
 dog generally! Just because his ia
 ther has money and he's been to col ! ~ge and something is expected O him. If he belonged to 50 clubs anC had a new dress suit every ten min utes should always see huntins : r,eorge's footsteps like second sei . or a familiar ghost, nice. lowing