The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-08-18
Dorothy DIG Says
By DOROTHY DIX
Worlds Highest Paid Woman Writer
Picking the Winner.

Picking the Winner.
A young man asks me how a youth
can tell which is the right girl when
it comes to picking out wife.
There isn't any way to tell with
absolute surety. son. There is no in
fallible test that you can apply TO =.
girl either mentally, morally, or pny-
sically which will settle beyond any
peradventure if she is the one parsic-
ular woman in the world for you and
the one destined by nature for your
mate.
Marriage is the great guessing game
in which the chances are fifty fifty on
your stumbling on the right answer
and being happy ever after, or blum
d ring on the wrong answer and pull
ing up in the divorce court 1t is the
one act in life in which neither i-ge,
wisdom, nor previous expeI hence count
for cent or are any guide to our feet.
You see calloW youths with rot
enough Judgment and intelligence to
be trusted to buy their own necktieS
picking out wives who turn cut to be
three times winners. And Sou see
elderly millionaires with barrels of
brains and judgment so clear and
cool that it sends stocks up or down
as 1t decides matter of finance, who
pick out for their second wives chorus
girls young enough to be their grand
daughters.
Nobody knows how a wedding is
going to turn out. Least of all do he
high contracting parties know, be-
cause they don't know how they are
going to turn out themselves. 1t is a
common thing to see a girl who was
a society butterfly before marriage
turn around and become a domestic
grub after marriage. 1t is lily
common to see the girl who has been
Cinderella before marriage dust the
ashes off her as soon as she enters
the holy estate and do nothing the
balance of her life but see how fast
she can spend her husbands money
Also many a girl who before maria ge
was so mild and meek that butter
would not melt in her mouth develops
after marriage into wife with the
continuous curtain lecture habit.
| Every girl is mystery wrapped I'D
IN chiffon and no man knows what he
is getting until he takes his prize
package home with him, and then it's
! too late to change
Nor is the uncertainty Of woman the
| only difficulty in the case. Really,
the chief difficulty is that the man
doesn't know what he wants himself
! in a wife, or rather he wants one
! th1ng IN a sweetheart and another in
wife. which is absurd as wanting a
garment which would be a swell bath
| ing suit and a smart suit to wear to
| business.
therefore, son, In trylEg to decide
which is the right girl. try to get some
! mental picture of your own ideal of
a wife. Do you want a wife who will
be thrifty and economical or do YOU
! want one who will be a coed spender
| and look like a fashion plate? Do
you want wife to dance the fox trot
| with you, or one who will have cooked
you a good dish of cornod beef and
cabbage for your dinner" Do you
want a wife who will be companion
| to you, or one who will sit at your
feet and ask you what you think she
thinks? Do you want a wife who
| will play golf with you ana who is an
out of doors woman. or one whose
idea of sport and excitement centers
around the bargain table in a depart
, ment store?
/ If you will decide these questions
the trick of picking out the right girl
for a wife isa't such d marvel of
| legerdemain as it is suppl csed to be.
For all married happiness rests at last
on congeniality and community of in
tereSts, and when a man and woman
i have these nothing else matters. All
the little difficulties are swallowed up
in the big delight of living with one
who has the same tastes and habits.
the same ideals and aspir: lions and
interests that you have.
You see. son. the trouble with youth
is that it is near sighted. 1t can't see
beyond the day. That is why it makes
its life companion. It thinks that its
chills and thrills and hectic fevers are
chronic malady, whereas they cure
themselves in a few months, at long
est. 1t believes that sor.ie miracle
will happen to some particular girl so
4 that she will always be sweet ard
twenty. with golden locks and peaches
and cream complexion and a Hssome
figure, instead of growing fat and
forty and grizzled headed.
j That is why a man marries a girl
, for no other reason than because she
makes his heart go temporarily pit-a-
pat and finds out six months later
, that he has made a mistake and she
wasn't the right girl for him. or why
he marries a living picture only TO
: realize that A Portrait Of a Beauty
isn't enough to furnish the house OF
r ma trimony on. and that il gets faded
and DANA ged and dismal and ugly as
: the years go by
Al If 1 were a young man out on a
e still hunt for the Right Girl, / should
t pick out the girl whom 1 found mos