Evening star., 1943-05-07
BY Dorothy Dix

! 1t would be bad enough, and reck-
less enough, If the girls who are
ruShlng INTO war marriages were
so much in love with the bows they
are marrying that they cid not stop
TO count the cost, nor ask how they
would be fed. nor Wherewithal
would they be clothed in the coming
years.
Doubtless Uncle Sam has been
matchmaker who has stirred up
many a laggard youth to the point
OF popping the question to the girl
who has waited long and patiently
for him to say the fatal words.
doubtless many an artless little
bride has been so hypnotized by
gazing at brass buttons that she
mistook passing fancy for a death
less devotion. And nobody will dis
pute that romance is as catching
as the measles.
But, for all Of this. the queer
thing about so many of these war
marriages is that thousands of girls
are taking the foolhardy risk of
! marrying men who are almost
strangers to them. of whose past
performances and future prospects
they know nothing, and with whom
they do not even imagine them
selves in love. because all the other
girls are getting married and they
don't want to be old maids. They
figure out that husbands will be
scarce after the war and that they
, had better grab one while they can.
This marrying Just to be a-marry-
. ing was logical enough in the Vic
torlan days, when a wedding ring
was a badge of respectabilitv and
marriage the only way in which a
girl could acquire meal ticket.
Anything then was better than the
ghastly fate of being a spinster
daughter and hanging, unwanted. on
the family tree.
But time has changed the status
Of the unmarried woman. Husbands
are no longer a necessity. They
are luxury. Girls today do not
have to marry for their bread ana
butter. Every door of opportunity
Is flung wide open to them. They
can do what they please. go where
they want to, crafty their own
tastes, live lives full of independence
and interest.
SO 1t becomes mystery why the
. modern girl, Sophisticated and world
wise as she considers herself to be-
wants to marry, unless she knows
she is bettering her condition. or
unless she is so much in love with
some man that life without him
Is clnders, ashes and dust. To think
that She marries just because she
Is still a slave TO the superstition
that there is some discredit in being
an old maid is to turn all of won-
ems alleged progress into a Sardonic
joke.
Certainly women do not regard
single bleSSedness with the same
philosophy that men Go. for men
think OF bachelorhood with more
or less pride. as showing how foxy
tneY were IN escaping the snares
that were laid for them. but women
"AS 'NAAA cotiIt W lllC lued tIld
If they stay single it indicates that
they We're somehow less attractive
and desirable than the ladies who
can write Mrs. before their names.
so We have had the sad spectacle
OF women who have gotten to the
panlcky years of around the 3Os. or
IN WartlmeS. as now, who are prac-
tlcally raiding the matrimonial bar
gain counters and snatching at anv
KIND of wedding ring. Fine girls
marrying second-rate men. Guilt
waited girls marrying dullards. Com
petent business girls marrying ne'er-
do-wells whom they will have to
( support. Not because these men
/ have any attraction for them. Not
/ because they are infatuated with
them. But Just because they don't
want to be old maids.