Evening star., 1942-04-28
Love Is Only
Reason for
Marriage

Fear of Being old
Maid VIII Bring
Unhappiness
By Dorothy Dir
Dear Miss DIX: I am very much
In love with q boy who viii have
to 60 into military service In a few
days. am now 23 years old and
haven't been married. Do you think
I should hop OF and marry now to
keep from being an old maid? /
don't know. but I think would
rather be an old maid than poor
widow woman. Am / right or
wronep MEG.
Answer-The poorest reason that
a woman can have for marrying Is
the fear of being an old maid. Every
marriage is full of trials and tribu-
lations and nothing compensates q
woman for entering into 1t except
being so much in love with man
that she feels that life will be Gin
ders, ashes and dist without him
and even in such cases she often
wishes she had taken the lonesome
trail instead of the one to the altar.
For q girl to give up her freedom
for the dubious pleasure OF writing
Mrs. before her name is for her to
sell her birthright for a mess OF
pottage. For one to doom herself
to spend the balance Of her LIE
in the companionship Of man with
whom she has nothing In common
and who bores her to tears, or who
NAV be q ne'er-do-well, or q Crouch,
or even q wife, -beater, In order to es-
cape being an old maid, Is to
commit an act of folly that you
would think that only . weak
minded sister would do.
But every day we see apparently
sane women rushing to the altar
with these poor matrimonial pros
pects lust because they don't want
to have "spinster" carved on their
tombstones. And not the least OF
the tragedies Of war is that 1t pro-
NOTES so many marriages that
should never take place. When girls
see SO many boys going on to join
the Army, they get into mad panic
over being old maids. 1t seems TO
them that the visible supply OF
husbands will be exhausted before
they ean get one, so they grab up
ANYTHING in trousers that they can
get their hands on and ny to the
parson.
They consult neither their hearts
nor their brains. They don't stop
to consider whether they are really
| in love with the boys or not, or how
much the boys care for them. They
do not ask themselves how they are
going to like having neither hus-
bands nor dates, nor what they are
going to live on when they are
neither maid, wife nor widow. nor
how they are going to adjust them
selves to the husbands, whom maybe
they will want and maybe they
won't, when they come marching
home from the war.
Thousands of girls are marrying
men with whom they are hardly
acquainted because they have been
caught up in the war hysteria about
marriage. I remember one young
woman telling me during the last
World War that she had married q
boy after only a couple OF hours
acquaintance and that she wouldn't
know him If she saw him again.
That Is an act OF supreme mad
ness, but even the girls who have
been engaged for long time to men
whom they are sure they love are
wise to put of their weddings until
after the war is over, because the
crucial experiences that every one
of these lads will 60 through will
change him. Some will be made
better, some worse, but all will be
different, and in q way they viii al
be strangers to the girls they left
behind them. And 1t may well bt
that neither will look as desirable
to the other as they did before.
And II, as so many girls fear, theil
boy friends fall In love with othel
girls and they lose them, surely Il
their love is that weak it Is better ts
find it out before marriage thar
afterwards. A marriage certiflcat,
has never yet held philanderer.
Dear Miss Dix: I am q single
woman in love with q married mar
who loves me. His wife and ! ars
good friends, and adore his son
Despite my efforts to keep 1t secret
my family has found out about us
and they are broken-hearted about
1t.
The question is this: Must this
man and ! suffer the rest of our lives
for a mistake made early in life, o.
have we a right to seek happinessi
UNHAPPY ONE.
Answer-Where win you find hap
piness in wrongdoing2 There car
be no happiness without peace Of
soul, and you can never have that II
you know you have broken up q
home, If you have taken q husband
from his wife, q father from his
son and made your own family mis-
| aro hle