WHAT ABOUT OUR IDEAL?

Otago Witness, Issue 3994, 30 September 1930, Page 63

WHAT ABOUT OUR IDEAL?

All this chatter about the ideal wife is getting me down! Every other man apparently has set out on the long, tong trail in search of her! You’d think from all the clutter you read and’ hear that it’s only man who is pluckiiy and hopeiully bearing in his mind the great and lofty ideal! We, I take it, have either met our ideal (great guns!) or are just not bothering ourselves about it! You’re wrong—twice over! The woman has yet to lie born who’s met her ideal! And we’re alwavs “bothering about it.” That’s half our trouble. The everlasting struggle of trying to stretch the actual up to the ideal —and failing! Our ideal is infinitely more human and likeable than yours, let me tell yon! Infinitely easier to live up to. Infinitely easier to live with. Our ideal is hardly lofty at all! We much prefer good things near at hand—where we can see them, touch them, understand them, love them!

All we ask is a fair sprinkling of common or garden human virtues, like generosity, kindness, broad-mindedness, an inch or two of understanding if it could be managed—a dash of humour. And there you have our ideal! We must have generosity first, last, and in the middle! For meanness ruins everything! Meanness kills love, trust, hope! Meanness is the unforgivable sin in a woman’s eves!

It doesn t cost money to be generous. You can be gaily, riotously, abandoned ly generous on two hundred a year. Y’oii can be hatefully, devastatingly mean on two thousand!

And we do so love a spot of kindness! Kindness matters tremendously! Kindness in little things! Kindness that isn’t asked for! And broad-mindedness! Broad-minded-ness matters a terrible lot.- Just think of the awfulness of living with a man who only possesses one point of view—his own!

And just a little understanding, please! Quite a little will do! An occasional glimpse at life from our angle! You’ve had a stimulating, brisk day, full of interest. We’ve had a grinding, dull one.

“ Understand,” then, won’t you, why we’re not blazing with fun and gaiety wheu you put your key in the front door in the evening. Life .isn’t terribly amusing for a stay-at-home woman. And if you could squeeze out a little humour, oh, how we’d adore you for it! Humour’s a tremendous help. Humour’s one of life’s kindest, friendliest gifts. Thing how it takes the hurtneSs out of things. Think how it takes you with a gay gallop over the bumpity bits of life! Just a dash of humour, and there you have before, you our ideal!— Jean North, in Home Chat.