The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1919-02-25
DOROTHY DIX TALKS
BY DOROTHY DIX
Worlds Highest Paid Woman Writer
The Girl and Her Family.

1t is the girls who use their wages
to refurnish the house and make i.
comfortable, not the boys. 1t is the
girls who pinch a little out of their
pay envelopes to send back home the
money to make motheI more comfort
able, not the boys. 1t is the girls who
deny themselves pretty clothes, and
perhaps even the chance of marrying
and settling themselves, to educate the
younger brothers and sisters. The
family martyr is almost invariably
of the feminine seq.
And not only do the girls sacrifice
themselves more willingly for the fam
lily than the boys do, but their par
ents feel that they have a right to
demand more of them than they have
of the boys = It's the girls mother
calls on to help with the homework
after their days labor in office, Or
store, or factory, not the boys. She
feels that the boys are so tired
they should rest when they come
home. 1t is, the daughter. not the son,
who is expected to give up her career,
and take care of her querulous old
parents.
All of this traditional theory of a
girls duty to a famil..-, as well as her
natural impulse. makes it difficult
for her to follow the mans way whe,.
it comes to making a choice between
her ambition, and her heart, and con-
science.
Yet only two courses are open to
her. She must either follow her oWn
star, leaving her family behind her,
or else she must be big en-, ugh 10
overcome the pride that makes her
ashamed of the mother who bore her,
and the sisters and brothers with
whom she played because their gram
mar is rickety, and they have not the
manners of a finishing school.
There is an intellectual snobbishness
oil io1 icI ND
it makes many of us scorn those at
whose feet we might well sit and learn.
Many an old man and woman whose
words come blunderingly, and whose
phrases are homely, have learned a
wisdom from life far more profound
than any that is taught in colleges,
and they could teach the educated
children who think them ignorant,
more of philosophy, more of psychol-
ogy than the sons or daughters who
. are ashamed of them ever knew.
But it takes a woman of heart. and
soul, as well as brains to understand
and appreciate that all knowledge
does not come put up in school sized
packages with a college label on it;
that it takes something more than
mamie IS to make a gentleman and
lady; that to a discerning eye rough
diamond is often more interesting
than a polls ed one, and whether a
woman is big enough 10 get this angle
or not on her family she alone can
tell.
- Whether the breaking of home ties
ever pays; whether any applause is
| ever sweet enough to make up for
tt loss of a mothers kiss and a
/ fathers pride in his {, 1; whether the
society of any intellectuals. tho
| they discourse never SO profoundly
about vers libre, and the symbolism OF
| Sudermann, and interpret the inner
! T. ing of Ibsen, is worth the I'M
| questioning affection of those who
| love you for yourself alone, and is
without reference to what you achieve
or don't achieve, as Kipling says, an
| other story.
| But one thing is certain. If self
| made woman is ashamed of her fam
! iIy,s let her get away from them as
fast as possible. In mercy to the
| family