The Hardin tribune-herald. [volume] (Hardin, Mont.) 1925-1973, 1943-05-06
By r

49,
~ me a very tragic letter.
L \ She is %, one of the most
thrilling and adventurous of
all ages, and her life is prac-
tically ended. She has bat
tered her way through more
experiences than many a
woman of sixty has known,
piled mistake upon mistake,
and now emerges from this
hopeless confusion to ask me
to tell her in just a few words
how she can start going right.
Well, Hopeless" the way to start
going right is to start going right.
1t is as simple as that. And yet
not simple, because like a hard
drinker, you have formed habits.
you have, as the Catechism puts it,
weakened your will, and left
within you a strong inclination to-
ward evil"
We're all apparently born with a
strong inclination toward evil; many
children seem to steal and lie natur-
ally, and sometimes would murder.
But social pressure in the nursery,
the desire to be liked, the early dis
covery that it is hard to get away
unpublished with crimes, and above
all the steady patient guidance of a
good mother set US upon u moral
feet. Very often this is such a sur
prising change that a small child will
innocently boast about it. I'm good.
I helped Lizzie do the dishes and I
didn't tell on Freddy. And I gave
my birthday dollar to the Red Cross,
didn't I, Mother?"
Evil Ways in Minors.
A little later, as a refinement to
this new-found nervousness, we
learn that Boosting isn't admirable,
so we try to stop that too. But
in the beginning many children are
untruthful, cruel, irresponsible,
dirty, no respecters of persons or
property. violent in anger and Ian
guage. And it is only because their
smallness and ignorance makes these
traits laughable at times that we are
SO patient in trying to help them
grow better.
Tho Girl u,Io ,,,ri&oe MA V;o1o
evidently had very little training.
She says she is an only child, her
parents divorced, her time from her
third year divided between them,
each criticizing the other and at
tempting to influence her, and wean
away her affection.
When she was IA she had a love
affair with a boy Of II. Two years
later she ran away from her STEP
father; her mother had gone on a
European trip and left her with him,
and she disliked and d%istrusted him.
She got an office job and fell in
love with the boss, a married man
Of As. Viola represented herself as
10, and he rented a small apart
ment for her. There was a police
case; her name was protected as
much as possible, but the man was
sent to jail, and to escape a suit by
his wife, Viola va spirited away to
New York and changed her name.
The strange fact about this girl
is that she is smart in some ways.
She got a job with a publishing
house in New York and rapidly
mounted to a good position. She
was very popular. and she says now
that If she had realized that COM
plete regeneration was possible she
would not have INDUCED in another
love affair. The affair lasted ten
days, but this time she paid a bitter
price, she was several months in
the hospital. and came out a very
much sobered woman. She was then
just %.
Promises Real Happiness.
Now she is in love with a soldier,
a fine, serious, responsible fellow
who will return to his medical prac.
tice when the war is over. VIOLA
longs now for everything she has
thrown away; youth. honesty, the