The Tacoma times. [volume] (Tacoma, Wash.) 1903-1949, 1915-06-19

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I believe. little book, that |
know how condemned man feels
while he is waiting through the
long. interminable days for the
great adventure.
Strange as it may seem. | be-
lieve that the days-the waiting
days of horror are as long to them
as they are to me-"
To-day have put my house in
order. Everything is ready for
the coming of my darling baby.
His little first clothes are lying
with his toilet articles in his little
basket. A note of instruction to
the nurse and note to dear Aunt
Mary, asking her to take charge
of him and the house for while,
is laid under the clothes at the
bottom of the basket. Ito be
opened and read in case am too
i'll to talk"
My own clothes are all arranged
In my bureau drawers with rib
bons in nightdresses and every
thing ready have gone through
all the old letters and keepsakes
in my desk and labeled them;
some to be burned and some to
be kept If my boy should live and
/ pass into the unknown.
And last of all, dearest little
companion of my life, | have been
going back over the path of my
life with you.
wonder If most wives date
their existence from their mar
rage. read extracts of those
many volumes before my wedding
day as If they were the pages from
the life Of another girl; one whom
l had known intimately for some
years, but one who died on my
marriage morn.
Some way, little book, | felt
rather sorry for that little girl.
She had such high hopes, such
great aspirations; she believed so
thoroughly in the possibilities of
love and life.
That ecstatic outburst on the
night before my marriage" was
her farewell to the life she had
known to the love which was in
her mind and heart, combination
OF ecstacy and idealism.
81 want to belong" was the
ecstatic cry of that girl whose
only hope of happiness was to be
merged into one with the man she
loved.
Oh, little book, little book, why
Is 1t given to us poor finite NOR
tails to imagine what we can never
hope to attain, to conceive what
we are unable to accomplish.
No mortal can become one with
another and no human being can
belong" to another as does one S
hands or feet or any other of the
members of ones body to be I'M
questionably directed by one
brain.
Neither the mini nor the soul
can belong to anybody but the
body tn mind and soul inhabits.
] know, little book, | conceived a
thing impossible of realization
but 1t was something so faseinat-
ingly beautiful that it has made
all the lesser joys of my married
life seem tame.
Now, in its place. because now
that | am not guided by delirious
and unreasonable love. | have
raised another ideal.
Is that, too, incapable of being
realized?
Can any wife become one-half
of the whole?
Can she stand side by side with
her husband in the comradeship
and partnership of welded life?
Through understanding on
both sides is 1t possible for these
halves that are not at first alike
to grow into symmetrical whole?
Am | fighting to bring Dick al
ways to my way of thinking, and
is he always calmly insisting that
his is the only way?
Do the bonds. that bind US,
which only four years ago We
welded together with what we
thought was something so strong
that only death could break them,
sometimes chafe him as much as
they do me?
Again, little book. we come
back to the stone wall. We can
hear the distant melody of life's
sweet song, but We cannot sing 1t,
for our voices are unframed and
we lack the poise or even inclina-
ton to sustain the note.
/ am so glad, little book, that l
can say these things to you with
out being called fanciful or silly.
I have been called both when l
have tried to make others under
stand the longings of my soul.
| know, little book. that every
woman has them more or less,