The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-12-09

is only playing fair with a girl if he does not marry until he is tired of running around with other wom- en and wants to settle down. No husband brings such sorrow to his wife as does the man who sows his wildcat crop after he is married. As long as a cabaret looks better to a man than home; as long as every fluttering skirt is signal for him to get up and follow: as long as he prefers the company of
 the boys to a wife's; as long as he
 would rather spend his money with
 the bootlegger than with the milk man; as long as he is more thrilled over a new make of automobile than he is over a new baby carriage, that long should he stay single. He | has no right to marry and make woman miserable with his side stepping.
 | So thank God, Brown Eyes, for your miraculous escape from being a de- serted wife and set your affections on some more domestic-minded man who is ready to marry.
 DOROTHY DIX.
 My Dear Miss Dix-My husband loves to tease, and do not enjoy b. ing leased. I know I should not let this annoy me, but sometimes when things have been going wrong and he starts to tease me, it is the last straw and l either lose my temper or start to cry. I know I lack sense of humor. Is there any way to cultivate one? | B. A. I.
 Answer-You have my heartiest
 sympathy, B. A. I. I know of few
 things more afflicting than to have humorist in the family who finds
 delight in holding up the weak nesses of others to scorn and ex- hibiting them as figures of fun to be mocked at by others. It always seems to me that a man who will tease his wife until she weeps is twin brother to the Grand Inquisitor who used the thumb screws on his vic tins until they cried for mercy, and that he has much in common with those fun-loving old emperors who flayed people alive and whose idea of having
 
 torn limb from limb. For the spirit that animates a teaser is sheer cruelty that delights in beholding the sufferings of others.
 The real comeback of practical
 joke should be with a loaded club.
 But, unfortunately, few women are
 fitted either temperamentally. or
 physically to hand their husbands
 this convincing bit of repartee when they are made the butt of
 hubby's choicest dinner-table story
 Therefore. all you can do is just to
 writhe and endure your husbands
 witticisms with what patience you can.
 As for growing a funny bone, that's a gift of the gods. It is nothing we can needn't conclude that you are deficient in humor because you do not enjoy be- ing ridiculed. Few of us enjoy the laugh when it is at our own expense. The only way you can stop your
 husband from teasing you is to pre- tend not to care. There is no fun in teasing person who isn't
 leased, just as there would be no sport in sticking pins in a rag doll
 It is the sticking of the pins into the live, quivering flesh that
 zest to the cruel sport. When you keep back your tears, and treat ynur huchond'C foocipU with StOli0
 indifference he will stop, for he
 will have no further pleasure in it when it ceases to hurt you.
 DOROTHY DIX. Dear Miss Dix-I am a married Wo- man, 20 years old, with a year and half old baby. My husband and I get along splendidly except about one thing. I am very fond of good times and am crazy about dancing. My one enjoy ment is to be on dance floor but my husband is very much opposed to danc- l ing. He will not take me to dance and does not like me to go with others, even his own sisters; and when do go. anyway, he goes out and gets drunk. do not like him to get intoxicated, but think he ought not to expect me to set tie down at my age.
 TROUBLED W IF E.
 Answer-I should think, my dear, that you were paying pretty high price for your dancing if it cost you q drunk en husband, and that you would be glad enough to exchange a little shimmying for surcease from bootleg liquor.
 Remember that, even if you are young, you have taken upon yourself the responsibilities of life. You have taken the happiness and well-being of man and child in your hands, and you have no right to think of your pleasures before their good.
 That's the pity of too early mar
 riages. A girl still wants the pleas
 ures of girlhood when she should be
 thinking of her duties as wife and
 mother. DOROTHY DIX. DIR. THOMAS TO ADDRESS | D ACCOHIATUON