THE UNWELCOME GIFT

Evening Star, Issue 22542, 9 January 1937, Page 2

THE UNWELCOME GIFT

[Written by Mary Scott, for the ‘ Evening Star.’] We do not, a? a family, run to New Year gifts; Christmas exhausts us imaginatively, and certainly financially. When, therefore, I saw a neat little parcel beside my plate; “From your family, washing themselves a peaceful New Year,” 1 know that there was a catch somewhere. Moreover, that underlining was sinister. No one is more deeply desirous of having a peaceful 1937 than the mother of a family, but only a blind optimist really expects to do so. Therefore I opened the parcel suspiciously and therein saw the open present I have always dreaded, the gift that is in my case so obvious that it seems almost a miracle that I have not yet received it. Every Christmas I open parcels of that flat, intriguing shape with secret misgiving; someone to whom I have owed a letter for a year or two, a friend whose anniversary I-have overlooked or for whose appointment 1 have been disgracefully late had certainly given it to mo at last. “Poor M . Her memory is obviously failing. Let’s give her one of those new, comprehensive journaldiary affairs. It’s the very thing for her.’’ But, no; it had been left to my own family, who know so well my prejudices with regard to all records, to deal me this blow. They bad united to give me a large and elaborate diaryjournal,” whose sub-title read ominously, “ A complete personal record for 1937,” . . . Why, the year was ruined already. Forcing a pleasant smile, I burned the pages of the elaborate and attractive book. It was quite a new idea to me. This was not one of those dull affairs that tell you all about the tides and leave five clear lines on which you are expected to record a perfect day. This was indeed a personal—and most private record —for 1937. One of the first columns that caught my eye was headed “ Personal Memoranda,” and was really the most impertinent production 1 have seen. The suggestive list began with the question, tersely put, “Ago”? Did they really think any woman was going to be so foolhardy as to answer that truthfully? Nor were the others any better, for “ Weight,” “ Measurements,” “ Height,” followed in rapid succession, to be succeeded by such nonsense as “ Number of your Car,” “ Make of your Watch,” and “ Details of Income.’ Searching queries followed: “ Books Borrowed this Month feverishly I probed my conscience: it was clear; Christmas preparations had seen to that. “ Books Lent ” ; I regarded that question more favourably ; there was some sense in it. Immediately I decided to keep a list of the books I rashly lent to insidious friends; I have meant to do it for years, having always before my ey%s the admirable example of two old gentlemen I knew in ray youth whose library shelves were at feast offered freely, but with this restriction—that the name of the borrower and of the book be recorded in a sinister little black note book kept for the purpose. “It saves argument,” they told me smoothly, and mentioned that they had seldom to request the return of any book. I should think not. The memory of that clear record would stir the most sluggish of consciences. Well, I should have no losses from my shelves during 1937, Perhaps there was some sense in the journal after all,

There were some very curious columns for private scrutiny only. One was headed “ Your favourites,” leaving it seductively open to tho writer to decide whether the favourites were to be people, or dishes, or occupations, or books. It seemed to me a column best left alone. , But the one next to it was tempting: “Your Pet Aversions.” It was breakfast time, always an unpleasant hour,' and I looked thoughtfully round my family, reflecting that with such inspiration I should have no great difficulty in filling that in. There were innumerable other queries to be answered, such as “Good Resolutions for 1937 ”: tho family watched me brightly, but 1 am far too old a bird to be caught in that snare. The page for favourite quotations that would prove “ helpful ” will also remain a blank; after years of tribulation, I have succeeded in selecting and memorising a score of suitable entries for a variety of autograph albums, but to ask anyone to confine their favourite quotations to one horrid little page of is an insult that belongs to the Victorian and “ booklet ” era.

There were pages of “ records ” to ho filled in, but even more exacting is it to be asked to supply notes of tasks to be done. “ Letters to be written this week”; “calls to be paid”; “accounts to be settled.” It is bad enough to have to do all these things without having to put them down in black and white in advance. But most paralysing of all is it to be asked to make out a list of your daily duties. They become at once so overpoweringly heavy, so unspeakably trivial. What are a woman’s duties? According to some, to feed, clothe, and generally tend her family; to be the complete wife and mother,.the adequate friend, the accessible acquaintance. If there is any time over she may read a little, and even write, provided it does not interfere witli the daily round. . . . But these are breakfast thoughts, and not to be entered in any diary upon the first day of the new year. There is one small section of each day devoted to “ social duties and pleasures,” and beneath this you must enter the friends who propose to visit you during each week. The idea appears to be that when a friend says casually: “ I’ll come to morning tea on Tues-day,”-you seize the book and put it down .in black and white. Well, I don’t know how the prospective visitor would feel; personally, I should be obliged to cancel the whole arrangement immediately; and, from the hostess’s point of view, what dould be duller? This mathematical precision alters it all, spoils the whole affair. If a friend is coming to see me, I don’t need a reminder of it. “ Why, all the spontaneity would be gone,” I remarked, and the Eldest Daughter remarked acidly that in her opinion a cake in the tin was worth a great deal of spontaneity in the heart, and a hostess, spontaneous or not, was better on her own door-mat than inexplicably missing when the friend arrived. There seems something in that, so perhaps 1 shall make those entries after all.

“ What are you going to do to-day?” the diary asks brightly. A heavy cross is the only answer to that question, for, if one were to fill it in conscientiously in the morning, the immediate reaction would he to go out for the day; and, even if one resisted that, how paltry would each day’s achievement appear—- “ the petty done, the undone vast ” when at close of day one reread that hopeful morning entry . . . Cux-i----ously enough, the actual space left for the record of each day’s doings was small enough. Compared to the old of diary, which dwelt with past only' save for certain homely little jottings such as phases of the moon, public holidays, and groat anniversaries, the few lines given to the diarist to say what he actually had done seemed insultingly meagre. Was Ito devote

so much space to such bald facts as my age and the number of my car—surely of no interest save to myself and the police—and put into these paltry lines all the grand doings of the completed day? Evidently the manufacturer of that diary had small opinion of the lives led by his customers. We were, in bis eyes, a dull lot; five lines might sum up our most splendid day. Nevertheless, it is a fascinating book —particularly to casual readers. Fill it in methodically and honestly, and you give the world material enough for a dozen de-bunking biographies. There is more capacity for self-revelation in a journal of this type than in all the oldfashioned love-letters. Too much for

discreet middle age. . . . Looking sadly at my New Year’s gift, and noting thankfully that it is niiinscribed, I fold it up and secretly decide to give it to the youngest person I know whose birthday occurs in January.