Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1922-09-02

"TM BEGINNING to think" said
= Macdonald Kent to his wife,
shat marriage is like golf-full Of
mental hazards"
II presume" said Jane icily, "that
: you're trying to say something dis
agreeable
"I'm trying to be pleasant. Pm
trying to get dressed and out of this
room without row." His voice
gradually lifted with his irritation.
"Thus," he finished, Setting a
worlds record"
Jane turned to look out Of the
window, and then she began to hum.
The sound of her humming bored
into her husbands ears maddeningly.
He was a reasonable human being;
he knew nothing had been done or
said which warranted either Of them
In giving way to anger and the usual
morning quarrel, but he could feel
Il coming on. There was an inev-
liability about these morning rows,
Q silly inevitability. Morning after
morning he had arisen with good
resolutions, and so, he knew, had his
wife-but the result was always the
same.
"Mental hazard" he told himself.
"Like driving a golf ball over the
pond on the sixth hole. You know
you're going to smash it into the
water, and you do" He turned to
Jane with elaborate self-expression
and painstaking patience.
T don't want to be disagreeable,
God knows" he said. 81 don't want
to start the day with rumpus,
but"
"But you always do" she said pro-
vocatively.
He compressed his lips and stared
at her, determined to control his
tongue. Honestly, Jane" he said.
81 wasn't trying to say anything dis
agreeable-that about mental haz-
ards. What I meant was that you
can't play golf without believing you
can make your shots-and >that'S
Just like marriage. We're off our
game. We're always topping our
irons or hitting out of bounds.
Purely mental. We could play the
game as we'll as we did six or seven
years ago if we just thought So"
~ hadn't lived with you ten years
seven years ago." Jane said with
hnality.
"God send you're not living with
me ten years hence" he said, his
anger suddenly ablaze.
'T wouldn't be living with you to-
morrow" she answered, "if there
l,.vas any way out. Oh, why haven't I
money Of my own? Why can't be
independent of you?"
'Well," he said shortly, "you
haven't and you can't-and there are
the kids, so all we can do is make the
best Of it"
vXIITH that he jerked on his coat and
W flung out of the room to eat a
breakfast which had become flavorless
for him as it had for his wife. Words.
words, words. He knew, as she knew
that what had passed between them
was really meaningless, was nothing
but sound and irritation. Both knew
that for the most part they lived
amicably. comfortably sincerely
wanted to live together in peace and
enjoyment " Then why? Why these
quarrels so easily lighted? Why this
evaporation with each other, this
shortness of patience. this painstaking
search for cause of affront? Mcdonald
could find no answer to his questions.
Their marriage had stretched over
eleven years, and there were two chill
dren, nine and seven years old Neither
Mcdonald nor his wife gave consid-
Grafton to the fact that the ages OF
their children might have much to do
with the steadily increasing inclemercy
Of their life together. The fact of
the matter was that the children had
passed babyhood In safety. They were
In school; no longer were they monop-
olizing the attention of their parents,