River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1913-10-16
LEAF TENTH.
Dashed!

SYY1 DO believe God gave that
IIa wise angel charge concerning
kS%e@SS1 me lest | get dashed, but |
CssYs7J just got dashed anyway, and
it's my own fault. not the angels. |
have suffered this day until ] want to
lay my face down against the hem of
his garment and wait in the dust for
him to pick me up. shall never be
able to do it myself, and how he's go
ing to do it l can't see, but he will.
That dinner party last night was bad
enough, but today's been worse. l
didn't sleep until long after daylight
and then Judy came in before o'clock
with letter for me that looked like a
state document | felt in my trembly
bones that it was some sort of sum-
mons affair from Judge Wade. and it
was | looked into the first paragraph
and then decided that | had better
get up and dress and have cup OF
coffee and a single egg before ! tried
to read it.
Incidental to my bath and dressing.
| weighed and found that | had lost
all four of those last surplus pounds
and two more in three days. Those
two extra pounds might be construed
to prove love. but exactly on whom
was utterly unprepared to say. | did
not even enjoy the thinness, but took
kind of already married look in my
glass and tried to slip the egg past my
inc nd T1oxycnIf RI chnUy II
down. 1t was work. and then | took
up the judges letter, which also was
work and more of it.
He started in at the beginning of
everything-tha is. at the beginning
of the tuberculosis girl, and | cried
over the pages of her as if she had
been my own sister. At the tenth
page we buried her and took up AL
fred, and l must say | saw a new AL
fred in the judges bouquet strewn APP
probation of him, but / didn't want
him as bad as | had the day before
when read his own new and old let
ters and cried over his old photographs.
l suppose that was TIE result of some
Of what the judge manages the juries
with. He'd be apt to use it on wo-
man and she wouldn't find out about
it until it was too late to be anything
but mad Still, when he began on me
at page 16 felt a little better. though
| didn't know myself any better than
did Alfred when | got to page 20.
What l am is just a poor. foolish
woman, who has a lot more heart than
she can manage with the amount of
brains she got with it at birth. Pm
not any star in a rose colOred sky, and
l don't want to inspire anybody. It's
too much of job. | want to be a
healthy, happy woman and wife to a
man who can inspire himself and man.
age me. | want to marry thin man
and have from FIVE to ten thin chill
dren, and when l get to be thirty |
want my husband to want me to be as
fat as Aunt Bette, but not let me.
An inspiration couldn't be fat. and I'm
always in danger from hot mullins and
chicken gravy. However, If | should
undertake to be all the things Judge
Wade said in that letter he wanted me
to be to him, should soon be skin and
bones from mental and physical exer-
else. Still, he does live in Hillsboro,
and | won't let myself know how my
heart aches at the thought of leaving
my home and other things. It's up in
my throat and | seem always to be
swallowing it, the last few days.
All the men who write me letters
seem to get themselves wound up into
skyrocket and then let themselves
explode in the last paragraph. and it
always upsets my nerves. was just
about to begin to cry again over the
last words of the judge when the only
bright spot in the day so far suddenly
happened. Pet Buford blew in with
the pinkest cheeks and the brightest
eyes / had seen since I looked in the
mirror the night of the dance. She was
in an awful hurry.
.'Molly. DEAR" she said, with her
words literally falling over themselves.
'sTom says you'll give us some of your
dinner leftoyers to take for lunch IN