THE KITCHEN COMPLEX.

Waikato Times, Volume 109, Issue 18342, 30 May 1931, Page 15 (Supplement)

THE KITCHEN COMPLEX.

WHAT TO GUARD AGAINST. All housewives must guard against the kitchen complex I For once they allow 'the kitchen to rule their lives they will lose all spirit, charm, and individuality, and may well endanger their health. We all know the woman who is 'tied to the kitchen. At first we feel sorry for her, and blame a cruel fate, or a cruel husband, for working her too hard! Sometimes our sympathy is justified, but often it is not. Often enough she ties herself to the kitchen, and will not allow herself to be weaned from it on any account. It is true enough to say that a housewife’s work is never done. But then there is no house under the sun that will not produce yet another job ripe for doing if you search around. However well-kept a house may be, there is always something else that needs doing; but, having performed the essential tasks, it is wise sometimes to let some of the not-quite-so-necessary tasks wait. This particularly applies, one feels, to periods when no domestic help of any kind

is available, and during the winter months, when housework is more irksome, and cheerfulness and strength not quite so capable of coping with Iti Having on6e cultivated a kitchen complex, the housewife becomes convinced that nobody can run the kitchen, and from the kitchen the whole house, so well as she can. She refuses help half the time because she’d rather do things herself, then she “khows they’re done properly!” If anybody offers, to take a piece of work or the preparation of a meal out of her hands she does not seem able to rest outside the kitchen, and will often enough keep running in and out to see how well or ill that hive of Industry is getting on without her. Instead of resting, as her good Samaritans intend her to, she finds herself other jobs to do 1 A Restless Type.. She should beware, for if she Is not careful she may develop into the type of woman who at first will not rest, and finally cannot rest. And that type, to say the least of it, generally prove a trial to other people as well as to themselves. Their eternal restlessness writes finis to any 'peaceful or restful atmosphere once, and for all. The woman with a kitchen complex wears a perpetually-worried expression, and is seldom seen other than in overall or apron. She is interested in practically nothing . outside the kitchen, and quite obviously she does not find that very interesting 1 On the rare occasions when she leaves all kitchen matters behind she Is generally too tired and worried to. enjoy herself. In very bad cases the housewife will take many of her meals in the kitchen because she has not time to have them decently. A sandwich and a glass of milk taken on the corner of the table to save time is well enough in an emergency, hut in the usual way it is better to take the sandwich and glass of milk into another room, if only for a change of atmosphere. Certainly, if the kitchen is at all unattractive or depressing, the rest of the family should not be persuaded to have meals there as a general rule, even to save time. Kitchen meals soon develop into a habit, and soon enough the house seems to he all kitchen, and the vision of every member of the household narrows down to the trials and tribulations of that one room. In Winter. In the winter a question of warmth may be a main reason why many people migrate to or stay in the kitchen —and for this very reason it is advisable, whenever it can he afforded, to make a point of having adequate warmth in another room. When there is a Are in another room a busy housewife is much more likely to snatch a few minutes rest and respite when she can. There is, when all is said and done, something to be said for tiny, crowded kitchens, for it is almost impossible I to develop a kitchen complex in ‘these I J (Continued in next colurmnJ ‘ '

They only admit of kitchen jobs, and too many people simply cannot be in them at the same time. No, it is the large and more comfortable kitchen that is the cause of the trouble I The woman who has a kitchen complex, and knows it, will do well Jo arrest the trouble in time! She should remember that in this hard world people do not thank you for saenflefn„ vourself to household gods! 'The average husband would rather have a smiling wife and a little dust than no dust and a worried wife.—Answers.