BLINDFOLD INTO MARRIAGE.

Auckland Star, Volume 55, Issue 22, 26 January 1924, Page 22

BLINDFOLD INTO MARRIAGE.

TRAINING NEEDED. (By JANE BURR.) The lowest-paid office job requires more training than the job of marriage. In fact the amount of money a girl may marry seems to be in inverse ratio to her fitness for the task in hand. It is quite correct to say, "The amount of money a girl may marry," for'men still control most of the important stufF. and they ought to be told that their value is in exact ratio to the size of their wallets When you hear of a young girl making a good match, it does not mean that the man is tall and straight and clean, that J his character is noble, that they love each I other. To the contrary, it usually means that he is crippled both in mind and body, that she hates him and he desires her, that he has made his purchase with a very full wallet. It is a mistake to say that a woman has no training for marriage. She has a very distinct training. She is taught from babyhood to guard her technical virtue, to dance, to play the piano a little, to sing a little, to look sweet, and to catch a rich husband. It always seems such a waste of energy for mothers to protect their daughters so earefuly, to keep them healthy and clean, flawless in manner, sweet in mind, and then to turn them over to an absolutely strange man whose only recommendation is a bank account. The mother having become hardened in the process of her own tragedy, feels that every woman's awakening is the same, and that it is better to open one's eyes to the tune of money than to the tune of poverty. There is sound judgment in her conclusion. Unbappiness i plus money is certainly better than unhappiness minus money. With money, one can at least get an occasional change of scene. Business and Tears. When you think about such things in cold blood it gives you the creeps, and in spite of your creeps you repeat the farce with your own daughter. "But I can't tell her the truth," you say. "What would the world come to? Shell find out in time." And ihe does find out in time. Usually the very first thing she does after awakening, is to throw on the ashheap the slender bait she used to make her catch. She won't sing, she won't touch the piano, she neither acts nor looks sweet. Perhaps at first she did try to make him understand. Though s!i> did not marry for love, she was .taught that money would make her happy. Money has certainly not made her" unhappy. In a luxurious age, no one can be happy in poverty—no one can even be clean in poverty. It takes a definite income to purchase the little decencies of life, but if you are happy on that income you will not be twice as happy when " that income doubles. In fact, it seems to work the other way. Couples who have jogged along comfortably for years on a small amount of money grow irritable with the friction that accompanies the responsibility of a fortune. Rich men are usually preoccupied with making more money," and when their wives weep and want to talk things out they grow angry. Tears upset them, and above all they hate talking things out. They all use the same words: "Haven't you got the best clothes, the best car, the best house in your whole j set! Don't I take you out every night? j Aren't your pearls the choicest that could be bought? Isn't your Pekingese the snob-nosedest in the neighbourhood?" , "Yes," she answers, snivelling. "Well, what do you want?" That is the husband's question all over the world! What do we want? We want tlie freedom of the highway into his heart; we want to £j there for rest and peace; we want to know what he feels, what he thinks; we want the inner man—the reality. We want him to come to us for rest and peace; we want to be of real use to him; we want a partnership in the deeper things of his life. Apportioning the Blame. And wanting these things so passionately we still go about our daily pettiness destroying every possibility of their development in him. A man is more satisfied with the institution of marriage because he asks for less. He separates his love from his work, and devotes himself to the latter. The average amount of waking time spent with his wife is about one hour out of the twenty-four. Thirty minutes in the morning while he is dressing and swallowing his breakfast whole, and thirty minutes at night while •he is undressing and getting ready for sleep. The rest of his life is spent either at his business or in society. Any man with a big outside interest can be married to almost any woman for an hour a day. > Occasionally such a man would like to spend a whole evening at home. He is always so tired that he has to stimulate an alcohol to keep going. But if he does stay at home, his wife takes that occasion to tell him what she thinks of him or she maintains such a withering silence that his nerves jangle furiously. No One hour a day with each other is ali that can be safely managed. Is she to blame or is he to blame? In the last analysis nobody is to blame "Why do we marry?" We marry because of a fundamental urge to reproduce ourselves in our children This urge in civilised life takes the form of restlessness, nerves, but above all—loneliness. If only we had someone who could give us rest from our nerves and our loneliness! When the restlessness and nerves and loneliness become too big for us we discover where we may go. We go to the altar and without £he slightest preparation, assume the responsibility of the future of the race. If you want to be a doctor or a lawyer or a. dentist you study for at least four years and you prepare for that study during all your youth. Doctoring and lawyering aren't half a s important as propagating, and certainly they came into the world millions of years after the first baby was born. Four years' training wouldn't do much towards straightening out the problem of marriage. The training should begin with the intake of our first breath. It is probably in their childhood that boys through shame, separate their sex from their love —the most vital cause of unhappiness in the women they marry. Even the most intelligent men still divide women into two classes; bad women, whom they enjoy, and good women whom they marry. Girls, because they are potential ' mothers, rarely separate their love from • their sex. It is one emotion, the strongest in the female soul. How . tragic, that this, her greatest offering, i the gift of her complete self, should* in • the majority of cases, go a-begging. Man does" not seem to understand what • it is she is offering, or perhaps he does i not want to be burdened with so precious a thing.