Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1920-12-09
DOROTHY DIX TALKS
BY DOROTHY DIX
Don't Overplay Your
Children
Copyright, 1920, by the Wheeler Syndi-
cate, Inc.

\ TOTHERs, don't make your children
nj your one eternal subject of conversa-
ton.
OF course you realize that every other
woman who talks necessarily about her
Johnnie and Mamie is the chief among ten
thousand bores, and people flee at her ap-
proach ii there is any avenue of escape open.
But don't refrain from monologing about
your children for the sake of sparing other
people. Do it to spare your children.
Very likely you can't understand how any
body could have been interested in the presi-
Dental election when your Tommy was try
ing to make the football team, and some
thing really important was happening Mo-
can you comprehend how anybody would
want to discuss the League of Nations whe1
you have bought a perfect love of a chiffon
dress for Maud. The only topics of real
vital, heart interest to you are your children
Naturally you just bubble over with thrilling
information about them, and if it makes other
people so tired they want to die, so much
the worse for them.
Now we all have an alenable, constitu-
tional right to life, liberty, and the pursuit
of our favorite subjects, do not really
have to consider the feeli-g Of our audiences.
| Let them defend themselves as best they can
But every mother should consider the well
fare of her children, and if she only realizes
the harm she does them by talking about
them continually, she would be dumb as an
oyster concerning her offspring.
But think of what a ridiculous attitude a
| mother puts her children in when she goes
about ceaselessly press-agenting them! Heav-
en-, in it's mercy ordained that every mother
should see all of her black crows white, and
| believe all of her geese to be swans.
| Hence the mother discourses by the hour
upon what a musical prodigy Mary is, and
what marvellous talent John has for acting,
and what belle Susie is, and what brilliant
chances of marriage Sadie has had.
| And when we see these small phenomenons,
| fnnI II yN0J1 HxyhN On Hn
taken out of the circus so that he could look
once more upon the thrilling billboard pic
| lures. For Marys music is merely tin-pan
humping, Johns recitation makes us feel
like sending out an S. o. S. call for chloro-
| form, and everybody but their mother knows
that Susie and Sadie are wall flowers who
never have any attention from men except
such as they get by feeding the hungry.
So while mother dscourses about her
| bunch of geniuses, everybody is laughing at
| them in their sleeves, and they become q
hooking and a by-word.
| Mothers Dragging about her children not
only makes them ridiculous, but it does the
young people a great mi, stice. For they,
| themselves are simple enough and have no
desire to pose as anything remarkable. Left
| to themselves and without mothers exploita-
tion they would even be regarded as unusu-
ally bright and attractive young people, but
when mother tells you that girl with
small sweet voice is second Melba, and
boy who is clever at amateur theatricals is
about to put Otis Skinner and John Drew Off
| the STAGE why, you Immediately become crit
| ical and disposed to deny them the merit
| they really have.
AS for a mother thinking that she can
| boom her daughters into being bellies by
representing them as being besieged by young
men, and spending most of their time turn
| ing away rejected suitors from their door.
nothing could be a greater mistake. Man!
nice girl gets shelved because young Sme7
don't want her mother to go boasting tina
their scalps are hanging to her daughter
belt.
Furthermore the woman who talks abou
her children continually, creates a preJudic
against them in the popular mind. We ge
bored with them. We are so surfeited witt
| them that we don't want them a any price
and that's fatal thing to the prospects
anybody.
Curiously enough, a mother never sue
ceeds in getting across to is the picture sht
wants us to have of her children. When sh'
spends hours upon hours ramming down oui
threats the superlative virtues of John, W.
| don't get picture of fine, and noble, ant
admirable youth.
| We think of John as sissy, and milksop
! and the sort of boy who does tatting, ant
! whom we would never select for any man
sized job.
And when mother spends weary and af
ficting hours descanting on Sallies fascina
tions, and charms, she has not piqued oul
interest in her. She has killed it. We DOM
want to invite her for week-ends, and to PAL
us a visit. We feel we have had all OF ho
that we can possibly endure.
The real reason that SO many boys haW
to leave home to go into business, is because
their mothers have talked their chances
death at home. People have been bored WITH
them so long that they have become resent
full and want to be done with them.
Their stock is below par because tnen
mothers have exploited it too much. After
a boys mother has assured you every tins
she has seen you for twenty years that her
son is the most marvellous phenomenon the
world has ever seen, it is disappointing to
find he is yonly an ordinary youth with me-
diocre abilities.
Therefore, mothers, put the soft pedal on
good and hard when you go to talk apout
Your children Do It everyday them. DON'T
raise expectations of their talents and looks
that they cannot make good, and for PHYS
sake don't feed people up on them so tnat
they will be associated in everybodys mlno
with that tired feeling.