The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1918-01-31
i DOROTHY DIX TALKS
By DOROTHY DIX
Worlds Highest Paid Woman Writer.


Calling Things by Their Right Names
Did you ever think what a reforma-
| ton would be worked in the world II
we only called spade a spade m
stead of referring to itdn vague terms
! as an agricultural implement?
And especially would there be
! great and permanent improvement
wrought in our own characters II we
| only had the courage to tag our ilttie
weaknesses with their proper appei-
Nations instead of camouflaging them
under a fancy and romantic souhoihs
brand.
Take nerves, for instance The
crimes against the peace and happi-
ness of other people that have oeen
committed in the name OF nerves
make countless thousapds mourn
Whenever you see a spoiled. in-man-
nered, uncontrolled child who howis'
kicks bites and screams II IL is
| crossed and who is little Fest TO
poor dear little Johnnie is SO nervous
! that he. can't keep still, and must have
whatever he wants.
Whenever you see woman VINO Is
as irritable a sore-headed bear. ana
who lashes out at everybody around
her with a bitter tongue, And who flies
! into terrible RACES if any one dares TO
differ with her or her tyrannical Will
| is thwarted in any way, and whose
husband and children go in fear and
trembling lest they provoke one OF
her maniac outbursts, you will find
that she talks loud and long about
| her poor nerves and assumes the air
| of a suffering martyr.
| If such people only faced the music
| and called their nerves by the right
name-temper-ther would be some
chance for them to reform them
selves A woman coddles her nerves
and thinks them interesting and aris-
| tocratic, but she'd be ashamed to ad-
init that she had the temper of a
Shrew. Temper ruins rar more homes
| than drink or any other vice, but We'll
never get it under control until we
quit calling it nerves.
Then there's sensitiveness. When
ever you meet a woman who is about
as comfortable to get along with as a
| prickly pear. woman who is always
reSigning from clubs and getting into
quarrels when she's on committees, a
woman who is always suspecting her
husband of fhrtations with, any woman
to whom he is decently polite; a wo-
| man whom you don't dare not to ask
ITO every dinner and lunch you give
no matter how Ill she fits in with
your other guests a woman whom her
employers have to handle with kid
gloves if she is a working woman, you
will find, out that she always speaks
of herself as being so sensitive"
Sensitivenessi Sounds nice and
| laoylike. But its real name is plain,
old fashioned. ~ unauthorized. un-
limited self-conceit-what the doctors
call meglomania and the alienists re-
fer to as the exaggerated ego. Such
Woman's whole thought is concen-
trated upon herself. In her own eyes
her little miserable dignity and pres
tlge are bigger than any cause. To
crafty her vanity she is willing to in
suit her husband and put her friends
ITO inconvenience. She judges the
whole world just as it reacts on her
puny self. There's just one cure for
bsensitiveness.. and that is to recognize
drastic measures to reduce the size of
your head.
/ Then there's temperament When
ever you meet people who are thirty
seven different varieties of plain fool
they invariably tell you that they are
temperamenta1- Whenever you find a
man who lets his poor old mother or
his wife take in boarders to support
him, he would tell you that is tenn
peramental and that he has never
been able to bring himself t. take any
part In coarse, vulgar struggle for ex-
, lstence. When you meet a man who
breaks a good wife's heart and leaves
his little children, to starve and go
ragged and cold while he philanders
around with other women and spends
them, he will tell you that it is i'm
possible for a man who is tempera-
mental as he is to love Just one
woman or be tied down by domestic
duties
When you meet a woman who is
slovenly. sloppy and untidx, and
whose clothes appear to have been
pitchforked on to her, you don't Have
to be told that she is temperamentaI.
All temperamental ladies appear to
, hail
combed.
When you meet a woman whose
children run wild On the street and
grow up like little savages, whose
home is a place of chaos and con-
fusion, who lets servants steal and
waste and bills grow to appalling
amounts, she invariably excuses her
self by telling you that all household
affairs, and even husband and chill
dren. are repugnant to one of her
temperament.
When you meet a woman who has
affinities and who wastes her life in
dreaming of what a great actress or
poet or artist she could have been IL
she had only not wrecked her life bv
marrying man who is nothing but a
clod that supports her in comfort and.
luxury, she will sigh as she tells Won
her sad story and say that she is so
temperamenal that she cannot be
bound by the conventions that are
good enough for ordinary women
Ninety-nine times out of a hundred
temperament is only the high fallutin'
name for rank selfishness and trifIine-
ness People who are bound to have
what they want regardless of how they
get it or the injury they do to others,
develop temperatment. Johns tenn
permanent won't permit him to work
in a grocery store because selling
potatoes and sugar is hard, monoto-
nous labor. Mary's temperament.
shrinks from the gas range and the
teething babies. because it's dull, ex-
hausting work to cook and nurse And
Mary and John have found out that if
you simply duck your load and refuse
to bear it somebody else picks it up
and goes on with the job.
The Iaeanest selfishness on earth is