Evening star., 1935-09-21

Didn't much want to marry, but did
it to please her and matchmaking
relative. 1 have no fault to find with
my wife She is good, considerate of
me, sweet and neat, and has never
been unpleasant or nagging. She is
not pretty and I catch myself not
looking at her because she isn't.
I have been so little satisfied with
marriage that I have started three
times to Reno. The first two times
was so uncomfortable in my mind
that after 10 days I went back home,
only to begin wishing had never
married at all. Now have just COM
pleted six weeks at Reno and with the
divorce so near I am beginning to
think I might want her after all. Still
have not enjoyed married life enough
even to try to fix up our house. and
1 am not stingy, and I am not in love
with her or any one else, but hate
to think of being tied to her as long
Answer-My advice to you is to go
on and get your Reno divorce for
the psychological effect it will have
on you 1t will clarity your feelings
for you as nothing else can. You will
lose your wife only to find her, so
to speak, and my prophecy is that the
next thing you will do after getting
your decree absolute will be to buy a
marriage license.
YOU are suffering from two mis-
takes The first is that You are
refusing to be your age At so you
are expecting yourself to be as senti-
mental and romantic as a boy, and
have all the thrills and palpitations
of a young lover. That is out for all
of us when we reach middle age.
Yet that is what you are expecting
of yourself You think you are not
in love with your wife because you
are not wildly, ardently, madly enam-
ored of her; because you don't feel
that you would die if you didn't see
her every hour; because you don't
see her as radiant thing of beauty;
because you don't palpitate at the
sound of her footsteps.
Forget it. Don't expect to have a
young heart any more than to have
a young body. You can't run and
jump as you did when you were 20.
You don't want to sing just for the
sheer joy of living. You've lost plenty
of the enthusiasms and beliefs with
which you started out as a boy, but
that doesn't keep you from enjoying
life In Saner, soberer way, nor from
having many years Of usefulness and
happiness before you. Only your
emotions have slowed down to the
tempo of SO.
YOUR second mistake was throwing
marriage into the discard before
you ever gave it a chance. You
didn't even try to make it success.
You didn't even attempt to build a
home together. Anything would have
been a failure that you went into
with that spirit.
A successful marriage is made of
many things, but mainly of co-opera-
ton and a common interest. If you
had started fixing up your home, buy
ing new furniture, making it beauti-
full and comfortable, the chances are
that you would have got interested In
it, you would have taken a pride in it,
and that all would have been well. But
you didn't do this You were a quitter
from the start and, like a coward, you
ran off to Reno from the responsible
ties you had assumed.
A FTER marriage almost every hus-
band and wife go through a pc
riod of panic in which for moment
they regret the step they have taken.
A sudden horrible sense of finality
seizes upon them of having to live
with this man or this woman until
death shall part them. A sunk feeling
at realizing that they have forfeited
their personal liberty. Marriage isn't
as glamorous as they expected and
probably nine out of ten would call it
of If they could without scandal or
complications. But the mood passes.
They get their second wind and a
clearer insight into marriage and turn
1t into what 1t was meant to be-a
happy companionship of man and
woman.
You are suffering from kind Of
matrimonial shell shock apd YOU need