The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1918-02-13
DOROTMY DIX TALKS
BY DOROTHY DIX
Worlds Highest Paid Woman Writer.
The War Brides.


on the eve of starting to war.
Unfortunately. however, Cupid has
never taken counsel with Solomon, nor
has the mere fact that a marriage is
inadvisable prevented its taking place,
and at the present moment it is a
matrimonial condition and not a
theory with which we have to reckon
An epidemic of marrying has swept
thru our training camps that has
proved fatal to thousands upon thou
sands of our soldiers who are sailing
away to somewhere in France to the
tune of THE Bride I Left Behind Me-
No use to argue now about the
wisdom or the folly of these mar
riages. No use to say that most of
them were the result of a passing SEN
timentality engendered by the thought
of leaving home and friends on the
boys part, and a mixture of patriot
ism, vanity, romance and brass but
tons on the girls part. The thing is
done There are the boys gone over
seas to fight for US. And here are the
lonely little brides, and. what are we
going to do about it?
This war has a curious wav Of
making all of us think of things we
never thought of before, and do things
tnat we never did before. and above
all. 1t has made us realize that we
can't escape our duty to our fellow
creatures. ard that we are all our
orothers' and our sisters keepers.
Ordinarily we might say it's no af-
Iair OF ours what becomes of Jim
Johnsons little young wife if Jim
JonnSon is foolhardy enough to- marry
a mere child and go off and leave her.
But when Private James johnson, u.
s A is risking his life on a blood
drenched battlefield to keep our own
daughters safe from the fate of the
girls OF Belgium and Flanders. If
makes a very great difference to every
one or US what happens to little Mrs
James johnson in her husbands All
sence.
ohe becomes our duty. She becomes
our ward. 1t is just as much up to us
happy and safe as if she were our own
little girl.
never were women placed in more
tIying positions than these war brides.
Practically. all of them are very
young: Most of them are mere child
binary course of events would not
nave married for four or five years.
war has suddenly pitchforked them
INTO matrimony for few DAYS or
weeks, and then pitchforked them out
asain' ieaVlng them neither maids,
wives nor widows
Or"if they are wives, they are wives
IN name only, as Bertha CLAW used to
say, with no husbands about to pro-
tect and entertain them, and no wifely
ouIieS 10 I'LL up their time,
AT first the little war bride is suf-
Ilclently occupied with the novelty of
ner position, and with preening herself
IN a pathetieally romantic pose before
her friends, and weeping into her new
embroidered pocket handkerchiefs.
But the pedestal stuff makes small
appeal to the normal American girl
It's uncomfortable and slippery and
she soon slides from it. Nor can she
continue to shed tears over a man who
is hale and husky, and who writes
back that he is having the bu1liest
time ever. and wouldn't have missed it
for a billion dollars
so the little war bride finds her
self woman without a social country,
so to speak. She hasn't a grievance
as has the deserted wife. She hasn't
a broken heart as has the widow She
hasn't a husband as a companion as
has the ordinary married woman. She
has the disadvantage of both the mar
ried and the single estate, the advan-.
tages of neither.
And she's young. Youth, thank
God, is the time when we hope for
the best, and believe that the best is
bound to come to us. Experience has
discount our joys. Youth is the time
when laughter comes to our lips more
readily than tears come to our eyes
1t is the time when every fibre of our
being calls out for pleasure and hap
piness. for making the most OF the
present moment.
Therefore, no matter how much the
little war bride may love her young
husband, no matter how her heart
turns to ice in her bosom when she
thinks of the dangers to which he is
exposed, she cannot make a profession
of her anxieties, or spend her days and
nights in wearying for his return.
She must have something to fill her
thoughts that belongs to life instead
of death She must have amusement,
entertainment. companionship. some
thing to put thrill into the drab wait
ing.
1t isn't that she is unfaithfu1 In
thought or spirit to her absent hus-
band. 1t is only that she is very
young, and that she is a human girl
OF course if the war bride belongs
to a we'll to do family this problem
settles itself She slips back into her
old place, among her old friends, and
is petted and made much of, and taken
about under mothers wing to places
of amusement, and all is well with
her.
But there are thousands of other
war brides who belong to poor families
who can co nothing for them They
have no beautiful homes. no assured
place in society to which to RETURN
Nobody makes a specially of inviting
10 teas diio iohSAASOiiSr e11AN e~-N
ing them to theater because their
husbands are on the front 'over
there" Yet these girls have the same
yearning for pleasure and the same
need for it as their more fortunate
sisters
1t is these little war brides that
should be our especial care, and no
woman, no girl can do her bit for her
country better than by adopting one
of them and seeing to it that she gets
her pleasures in such a fashion as will
keep her safe and steady during her
husband absence
For there are great dangers in the
young wa brides position. Being a
married woman emancipates her from
her parents control, no matter how
Young and silly and inexperienced she
may be- She is free to do as she
pleases. to live where she likes, to go
N L, diSr.refinn and