Atlanta Tri Weekly Journal

who is cultured in mind, elegant in manner, fastidious in dress, will often choose as a wife a girl whose pretty face has captured his fancy but who is uneducated, untaught loud of voice and bold of manner, and who knows neither how to dress or to conduct herself in society. Her husband would like to polish his rough diamond, but he attempts to do so at his peril. If he suggests that she try to imitate the quiet charm of manner of some old woman friend of his, she becomes green-eyed with jealousy. If he finds fault with her clothes and tells her that real ladies do not wear flamboyant garments that shriek at the beholder, she goes into hysterics. If he tries to get her to read and study, she weeps that 'he is tired of her and no longer loves her. And, after having proven by his failures that no husband can improve his wife, he gives up the hopeless task and settles down to make the best of his bad bargain or else repudiate it, according to the type of man he is. Certainly it is tragical that a woman can not tell her husband that he eats his soup audibly, or that he has told the same old stories over and over again until people flee at his approach. For if she could tell him she could have him from being a laughing stock among his acquaintances. Certainly, it is a tragedy that a man cannot tell his wife that when she paints herself up like a barn door, and dyes her hair the color of strawberry jam, she makes of herself a figure of fun, and that she bores people to death talking about her children. For if she would listen to him it would have her from being ridiculed wherever she went. But neither husband nor wife dare offer a word of honest criticism for fear of bringing on a scene, and being accused of nagging. Perhaps the reason that husbands and wives are so much more sensitive to criticism from each other than they are from any one else is because their vanity cannot stand the knowledge that they are not perfect in the other one's eyes. Their self-complacency cannot endure the shock of finding out that the other one thinks that they need any improvement. In the days of courtship the man has told the woman that she was an angel, that she was as far above other women as the stars are above the earth, and that she was the most beautiful and gifted and marvelous being ever created. The woman marries him expecting to listen to this paean of praise the balance of her life, and naturally she doesn't enjoy the douche of cold water she gets when her husband begins telling her of her faults and suggests remodeling her character, her manners and her habits. Before marriage the woman has put in many solid working hours kow-towing before the man, and telling him how big and wise and strong and great he is, and he assumed her support for life in order to have ever at his side a competent incense burner. Is it any wonder, then, that he is chagrined when he finds out that his wife considers him a subject for reformation, instead of admiration. All of us know that the world at large has a keen eye for our weaknesses and a dull one for our virtues. The thing we really marry for is to secure for our own the one person who really admires us, and our vanity will not permit us to see that that person also sees our faults. That is why husbands and wives cannot offer each other helpful and constructive criticism.

DOROTHY DIX

(Copyright, 1924)