The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1911-12-27
NEWS OF INTEREST TO OUR FEMININE READERS
How to Manage Mothers
(By Doctor Frank Crane.)


 (By Doctor Frank Crane.) There is many a mother and boy who love each other dearly, who would each gladly die for the other, and yet who find it very hard to live with each other.
 I am not soing to tell mothers what to do in such eases, for I have never been a mother. but I wish to offer a | few suggestions to the boy, how to get along with his mother, for have been a boy
 To speak plainly, one trouble with mother seems to you to be dlsposl- tion to control your actions a little too much. This sometimes goes so far that she appears to nag. YOU are apt to resent this. You may pe- come impatient, petulant- You may perhaps you may tell her as much. So there comes heartpain and es- arrangement.
 Perhaps if you understood the cause of mothers constant interference, you could adjust yourself better ito 1t. And the cause, mainly, is this. You were a little baby not long ago. Your mother had undfsputed management of you. She washed, dressed, nursed and tended you all day long. At night you were near her protecting hand. She was by nature fitted TOT thfs by having vast store of a pe- culiar kind of affection, stronger and sweeter than any other feeling that ever comes to mortals You may De loved, admired and desired by others, but never in just the way and with just the intensity that mother had.
 And now you have changed. Her baby is gone. You have mind and yd a will nf own. YOU are no longer just part of her. It Us like breaking off piece of her soul.
 Think of this when you judge your mother. She is, confused. She is ham, ding. one of life's most complex mys- teries-the change in one we love. Why Mothers Never Change
 She can never entirely. get over re- garding you as her little baby. Don't you notice an extra thrill of fondness in her voice when she calls you her baby? It possibly frritates you; but it stirs the sweet music in her heart If you live to be grown man, with whiskers, down in her secret thought you will always be her baby, that wonderful creature that grew out of her own body and soul; hers in a sense of ownership no thing and mo- body else can ever be; hers, as bud is the branch's, no matter who plucks and wears it, as a fruit is the trees, no matter who takes and tastes it. Instead of fretting at this sense of ownership, this tendency of mother to boss and manage you, suppose you make up your mind to accept 1t, and to adjust yourself to it. Let her have her way. Humor her. It won't hurt you.
 I know a man forty years old, with affairs, who calls to see his mother every day and asks her advice about underclothes and food and a hundred petty things. It makes her very happy.
 Make up your mind never to show irritation or indifference Or the shad- ow of contempt for her or her opinion. Nothing can wound her more deeply. Efsobedience, anger, and even rebel lion are not so bitter to her as to feel that what she thinks and says amounts to nothing with you.
 Don't neglect your mother. If you are in a different town write to her every day. It will only cost you two cents in stamps and ten minutes in time. Do it, regularly as the sun rises. know of no way to cause happiness on this earth at less ex- pense
 Form the habit of being polite to ten. When she enters the room, get up. When you meet her on the street, take off your hat. When she is around, pay her as much attention as if she were a peachy checked girl with a dimple. When you speak to her, let all the world see by your tone and manner that you esteem and honor her.
 The Question of Obedience
 I do not say that you are always to obey your mother, invariably do as she says. AS you grow up that is going to become more and more inn possible in the nature of things. You will have to decide things for yourself and assume your own responsibilities. But if you cannot give obedience every time, you can heed and esteem and courtesy.
 It is all a matter of adjustment.
 There is not a lot of rules for you to learn; you do not have to be con- stantly watchful; you do not have to have to do is to take the right atti- Jude to her, and keep it.
 What Jesus said to Martha is appK- cable here: Thou art careful and troubled about many things; but one thing is needful.'
 What is that onething? Iris a sim pie thing, of course, and an old one; as most great human truths are both old and simple.
 You will find it away back in the Ten Commandments: Honor thy fa- ther and thy mother"
 And. a better. deeper, wiser word was never uttered. Honor thy motheri" For after all that is what she wants.
 No matter how sure you are that she is wrong, no matter how persis- tently she crosses you, never suffer yourself to descend to angry dispute, Tor sullen grumpSness. Honor her! For better or for worse, everywhere, every time, honor her!
 For the day she went down to death for you, honor her!-Woman's World for January.
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