The Washington herald., 1921-09-19
AMOROUS ANCIENT
HAS BRAINSTORM,
SAYSDOROTHYDIX
There Is No Fool Like an
Old Fool, She De-
clares.
~ DOROTHY DIX.


eniidren and grandchildren. He has
oeen successful in business. and
amassed a comfortable fortune, and
mas led a respectable. God-fearins
me- and is a pillar in the commun-
ny In which he lives.
But now he has fallen in love
With a girl in her twenties. and
ne wants to divorce his wife and
marry her. No-there's not a
thinE the matter with his wife.
shes as good a woman as ever
hEed. and she worked shoulder to
shoulder with him during all the
years that they were getting
start in life. and of course he will
provide well for her financially.
The trouble is that she's an old
woman At sixty, done with ro-
'nance, while at sixty-four he feels
himself a young and sentimental
boy.
And he wants to know what 1
think about it. Why, l think that
he should go and bang on the doors
of the nearest lunatic asylum until
they take him in, and lock him up
IN a padded cell where he Will De
safe until his attack OF mental
alteration is over.
He is suffering from a brain
storm, poor thing, and IL isn't safe
tor him to be at large, with his nice,
tat pocketbook, in a world that
IS full Of greedy young vampires,
who are just looking for dotty. rch
old men upon whom they can feast
As for his being in love with
girl young enough TO be his grand
daughter. pouf-that's an illusion.
while as for his believing thot she
loves him. that's a delusion that
any competent alienist would pro-
nounce an unmistakable symptom
OF senile dementia.
Such things don't happen in
real life Old bones don't sudden
ly get retuvenated. Old hearts,
that have gone along doing their
work for forty years with no more
emotion than a steam pump, don't
all at once begin to thrill. and
culver. and palpitate. Romantic
love no more comes back to the
man OF sixty-four than an apple
tree blossoms in December. and
the man who thinks that he can
play Romeo with one foot in the
grave is simply the victim OF
mania.
Nor do young girls fall in love
with old men. You never hear OF
= beautiful young heiress falling
N love with an aged pauper. 1t al
ways a poor young girl who per
suades some rich old idiot that
he has won her unsophisticated ar-
fections. The old man, who thinks
that a young girl is in love with
his charms, is seeing things, and
needs a keeper.
Leaving out of the discussion
the dastardly wrong that man
does in forsaking the faithful old
wife who has given her life to his
service, who has borne him chill
Iren, who has Rursed him in sick
ness and who has cherished him
IN health. and whose industry and
thrift have done just as much to-
wards building up his success as
mis- labor has, il is an act of un-
mitiSated folly, just for his own
sake. for an old man to swap an
old wife for a new one. He gets
nothing out of it but misery and
regret
In the FIRST place he makes him
self an object of derision and con-
tempt to all who know him. He
IS a figure Of fun, Of mocking and
-idiculc. because everybody sees
how easily he has been taken in
nv an adventures. Hard-headed
business men no longer trust his
Judgment because he has given un
rnistakable evidence that his mind
Is weakening. and he is becoming
silly and senile.
II is not IN uncommon thing for
men who started out as poor boys
and have acquired fortunes to cast
OF their old wives, and marry
young ones to match their new
prosperity. but IL you will notice
Won will see that invariably 1t
marks the end of the mans career.
VI. begins to go downward from
tEo dav he does il. because nobody
Lonors, or trusts, or respects the
man who can be made a fool Of by
a woman.
The old man who can see that
- VIII. has grown elderly, but
Tho fancies himself still mere
,-,urb IS. in the phrase of the day,
.,npIv kidding himself. He Is
,gfTsrinE from a delusion just as
r-rrh as the lunatic who tells you
mat he is the Pope Of Rome. All of
rs seek to believe that We look
,'or,n-er than our age, and have the
re1rinC Of children, but when We
,,,rrc IN contact with real youth we
y.r,- soon find our error.
let the old man try to 60 the
,,cc OF his young wife, let him
ir,rnp at tennis. and dance one
1aIf Of the night, and joy-ride the
orber half, and rush from pleasure
80 Measure, and place to place. His
old homes will cry out for the easy
,hair nv the radiator. and his tired
ia rvss will close in sleep, and
his Danting old heart will make
Tfr, wheeze and cough, and he will
,rJsb usten enough that he was
81 with the old wife whose idea
. hilarious evening was doing
,ver a newspaper by the fire.
And what companionship can
AN of sixty-four expect from a
younC girl? The subjects that are
tbriIIinEIy interesting to her. mean
,o,binC to him He does not even
Dsak her language, while the
,hinrs that he cares for bore her
stid When We get old we live in
,be mast and no woman, though
~ we're Aspasia herself, can hand
IN, as fascinating a line of CONVEX
lion to her husband as the one
,yho can go back with him over
snrty years Of life and say. DO
,ou remember?
n is the work they have done
,,s-ether, the plans they have
manned together. the hopes and as
pirations they have held in COM