MY IDEAL MAN.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3130, 14 August 1922, Page 7

MY IDEAL MAN.

(By a ~\i[oman.) One of the evening newspapers has been inviting its women readers to describe,in a few lines their ideal man. I have seen a selection of the published replies, and am wondering what 1 should have written myself. My ideal man? Yes, I think I have seen him often enough in my dreams, although I may not always have been able to see him very clearly. I fancy, however, that he is invariably tall and athletic; essentially a strong man, but not too incredibly handsome. I suppose you would say that ho had a “good” face—the face of a man whom you could instinctively trust. 1 can figure him. cool and self-reliant in the face of danger, a hater of shams, yet a man who is eager to see the best rather than the worst side of others. Jn the affairs of the world he is a man of resolution, a man who knows what ho wants, and by sheer force of personality obtains it. He works hard, and loves his work, and so, naturally, has risen to the top of his profession. The country, in fact, looks up to him as one of its great figures. His manners, equally in his own home and in society, are perfect. His clothes bear that air of quiet distinction with marks supreme taste in all the lesser matters of life. His laugh is loud and honest when it comes, and he loves to bo surrounded by children, to whom he can tell the splendidest stories. He is a very great gentleman And at first we are the merest acquaintances. We meet casually here and there, and talk of the most ordinary things. Yet in a moment the world has turned gloriously upside down, and he has singled me out from all other women. He wants me for his own, not as an impossible goddess to be worshipped, but as the woman 1 am, to be loved. He is aware of my faults, but, because they are mine, finds no need even to condone them. There is an indescribable bond between us, which prevents any misunderstanding or quarrel. And because I am a woman 1 want to see, and do see, a look in his eyes that is reserved only for me. That, I expect, is what I would have written. I know a man who bears no resemblance whatever to any such paragon. He is short in stature, and suffers from asthma. Ho is the shyest of creatures, and can rarely make up Ins mind about anything at all. His clothes are the despair of his friends, and he is one of the laziest men ever born. Absurdly enough, he is afraid of dark. He frequently quarrels with his wife about the most trivial matters, and shrinks from any children but his own. He has spent half his life in the same city office, and there seems little likelihood of his ever increasing his income. Altogether an insignificant creature in the eyes of the world, and yet to one woman, as I happen to know, the ideal man. Curious? Not a bit. You see, he is my own husband, and I lovo him.