Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-12-23
CALF LOVE IS
MOSTLY HARMLESS
Alright Provided 1t Doesn't
Result in Marriage, Says
Dorothy Dix
BY Dorothy Dix.

| youth or the tender age OF lS
writes to me that he is desperately
in love with woman five years his
senior, and asks my opinion of the
propriety of engaging himself to the
lady.
Don't do it, son!
Calf love is as passing an ailment
as the mumps or measles. 1t is just
a hectic fever, mighty engrossing and
worrying while it lasts, but in a week
or two, with proper treatment, 1t will
all be over and you will be well
| again.
1t isn't a chronic complaint, like a
lesion of the heart, from which one
never RECEIVERS.
There are plenty of chances in mat
rimony, son, without taking any
chance on what you are going to be
and like yourself when you grow up.
| Therefore, give yourself the benefit
of the doubt. Don't tie knot with
your tongue, while you are still a
mere infants in arms, that it will take
heartbreaks and shame and divorce
lawyers to unite when you arrive at
mans estate, and find out what sort
of a wife you really want and need.
OF course, you say that you are very
mature for your age, that you have
seen lot of the world, and are
wise" and all the balance of it, but
it isn't true.
Every boy that ever lived thought
and said the same thing. A half dozen
years later he looks back and laughs
| at his folly, and wonders what on
earth he ever could have seen in that
brainless little chit Susie Brown, or
that heavy weight Marian Jones, that
could have made him even fancy he
was in love with her.
And then he fetches a prayer of
thanksgiving that he didn't marry
her, while a cold shudder chases UP
and down. his spine as he thinks just
supposing he had!
For a mans taste in women
changes and the feminine charms
that attracted him in his boyhood no
more appeal to him in his maturity
than do the pink ice cream and
| chocolate soda water for which his
soul used to hunger in his youth On
the contrary, they both give him that
same sick, sinking feeling of having
had enough and too much.
4 There are no more pitiful tragedies
in the world, son, than those in which
high-minded, generous-hearted, ro-
mantle boys fall victims to their de-
lusions about being in love.
For, look youl You are not the
first lad who ever thought himself
in love; and the mere fact that you
are in love with woman five years
older than yourself proves your
case typical.
Practically every boy that ever lived
has been through the same expert
ence, for the minute q youth finds out
that his pulses can fiutter, and gets
to the place where he can distinguish
between a pretty woman and an ole
one, he diagnoses his case as one o1
undying affection.
Sometimes there is one to stretch
out a saving hand and keep him
from committing suicide by marry.
ing while he is under this hallucina.
ton, and he lays upon shoulders toe
weak and young to bear it the heavy
load of matrimony. If he is poor by
that act he seals his doom, for he car
never get ahead with q family Il
support, and you will find him, ex
cept in rare cases, an old, rn-out
broken down man at 40.
? The boy who marries also takes
a 100-to-1 shot at domestic happiness
because he risks his own development
The woman he marries may be good
enough and intelligent enough, ant
cultivated enough for his mate wher
he is only a crude, raw gosling; but
what II he grows, as so many mer
do, into a beautiful swan, with wide
strong wings, capable of soaring into
the upper air?
Observe the people you know. son
Do you think that Jones, with his
broad, tolerant outlook on life and
his culture, and his charm, would
have married that stupid little Mrs
Jones If he had waited until he came
to himself?
Would Smith, who Is so brilliant
a conversationalist abroad, who Is
the wit and toast of every dinner
table but his own, but who rarely
speaks at home, have married Mrs
Smith, who never understands a word
he says, and who does not take the
slightest interest in anything but
clothes and servants, if he had waited
until he knew what sort of a com.
rade he needed in life?
No, no! You know they wouldn't
And, worse still, they knew they
wouldn't.
Nine-tenths of the matrimonial
misery is the direct result of early
marriage. 1t is the boy husband
who becomes the middle-aged
rounder.
The French have q proverb that
lthe roue makes the best husband
| This is not because ne has seen and
known the wickedness of the world
but because he is old enough when
he marries to have reached his own
mental stature and knows what lie
wants in a wife.
Matrimony is none too certain a
| game anyway, son; but If you sit
into 1t while you are still boy, fate
loads the dice with which you play
and you haven't one chance in mil
| lion to win out.
Becoming engaged while you are
still a boy is scarcely less haz-
| ardous.