THE DAY OF THE SPRINTER

Manawatu Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 3247, 18 January 1926, Page 12

THE DAY OF THE SPRINTER

Marriages between professional men and women of middle age, says an Englishwoman in Paris, are becoming quite a feature of Paris life nowadays. The spinsters arc women for the most part successfully earning their own living; the men seek in this sort of co-partnership a refuge from lonely ago.

arrangement, interests are shared, and when work is done there is a symwhen work is clone thert is a sympathetic companion at hand. Two writers, two musicians, or two employees of middle life now frequently join forces, and some very successful households have been the result. Collarboration in work is not essen. tial, of course; two people with different vocations car, work and live happily side.by side. There is plenty of fun in the organisation of these middle-aged households . The couple settle, of course, in the flat that best contains them, whether his or hers, but there has to be a severe weedlng.out beforehand. ,

“When my husband got his belongings here,” said one middle-aged bride, “I had to organise his wardrobe and dressing room or him, for he is just like a child in such matters I found he had 25 pairs of shoes and boots .and not one fit to wear,” and she went off into peals of laughter at the recollection. She is n busy professional woman, but she has tho home.making instinct and a beautiful orderliness reigns in the abode. When the pair of-them snatch a few hours to give to their friends, their salon is one of the most agreeable in the British colony of Paris. Another recent middle-aged match

is that of two persons employed in a bank. Well-mated but 111-lodged, they have between them bought a plot of land in the. suburbs ,and with their own hands are building a home. Any Saturday afternoon or Sunday you may find them at work, and their friends make the trip to Aulnay to see the progress ot the cottage, “How in the world did you know how to do It?” they are often asked. The bride explains in all simplicity that her father was a builder.

In these mlddlcjaged matches, the bride Is anywhere between 40 and 50; the husband is sometimes over 50. It is perhaps men who most fear a lonely old age; middle-aged spinsters seem to be usually centres of little groups, but nevertheless they find in marriage a fuller life, and very easily merge their interests in those of their husbands.