Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1919-02-24
LITTLE TALKS BY
BEA TRICE FAIRFAX

Is giving up pretty nearly every
thing you can think of, for the sake
of the man you marry, a proof of
your love for him?
Multitudes of women have sup
| posed this to be the case, and have
acted on 1t. Girls who marry young
| are particularly likely to have this
idea, to believe they're going to be
better wives by ridding themselves
of every interest in the world but
one.
| l believe any truly wise woman
would tell you that this is a seriously
mistaken view.
Girls who have a pretty talent for
music radiantly announce to you. as
! soon as they become brides, that they
are giving up" the piano or singing
| in order to devote themselves utterly
! to their husbands and their homes.
Studious girls boast that they are
| going to give up reading and educat-
| ing themselves, athletic girls reck-
lessly fling away their tennis rackets
and skates. Girls successfully start
| ed in trade or business or profess
sion throw it all overheard in
| twinkling.
Indeed there are girls who go a
content with the inevitable separa-
tion from the family group they have
| grown up in, these sfoolish young
creatures plan practically a lifelong
isolation with the man they are to
| marry. Friends are cast into the
scrap-heap along with interests and
| accomplishments.
Pm giving up my really close, in
innate friends" a young bride de-
clared to me the other day. 81 think
| after a girl is married she doesn't
! need any friends but her husband"
Making Yourself UninterestinE
| Now what does this really mean?
Does it mean that a girl really ex-
| poets to give twelve or fourteen
| hours a day to cooking and sock
darning, that this wonderful new life
/ of love and promise is to be merely
an uninterrupted round of drudgerY?
She would deny anything of the
| sort
Or does she have an underlined be-
! lief that she is making herself more
attractive, more desirable, by oblit-
Grating her own mind and personal
! ity as far as possible and becoming
sort of blotting-paper to the ex-
| preston of her husbands ideas and
| interests?
! Or does she think it's part of the
pomp and state of being married to
! parade the fact that a woman who
! is equipped with a husband has only
domestic accomplishments and only
''wifely" notions.
Not many men nowadays marry
with the idea of providing them
selves with an expert domestic SER
want. And 1 hope there aren't many
women who are willing to be mar
ried for that purpose alone.
Sensible men and women marry
because they love each other. be-
cause they expect to help each other,
and because they hope to be the par
ents of beautiful. healthy children.
And isn't it perfectly plain that
woman cant possibly become "A ca
pable wife and mother just by maxi
ing herself uninteresting?
In fact, just the contrary is true.
If you who read this are at that
delicate and perilous moment of be-
ginning your married life, that mo-
ment when it is so easy to make
grave mistakes and SO hard to repair
them-let me urge you not to give
up" anything that will make life
richer and wider and more signifi-
cant.
Try TO Enlarge YOur Life
You will need all the interests you
can lay hold Of. Don't imagine that
marriage can be made successful by
continual love- making alone. Don't |
subject your husband to the strain |
of making him think for two Be |
an Independent personality.
If your object in marriage is to |
keep your husbands love, you'll have !
to fnl some other way of doing this |
than by merely being pretty and |
cute If you know anything about !
music or books or business or out
doors, hold fast to it. You can make |
it your contribution to married life |
You can make your married COM
panionship a matter of healthy give
and-take. It's the marriages con-
Quoted on that principle that are the |
successful ones.
And as for giving up your friends !
merely in order to concentrate on |
your husband, I assure you that you |
should have just the opposite aim.