THE LIGHTER SIDE OF LIFE

Ladies' Mirror, Volume I, Issue 5, 1 November 1922, Page 26

THE LIGHTER SIDE OF LIFE

THE NEWCOMER IN SUBURBIA

students of society have V-< maintained that women are the real social members of a community; that it is they who are the moulders and creators of the polite forms and usages which we call etiquette, the playing rules of gregarious life. This is an erroneous assumption, based upon surface observation. Women appear to carry the social banner, but it is men who really create the principles and write the slogans. If the actual evolution of a code of social usage had been left entirely to women we should still be in the Neolithic age, when calls were made with the exclusive intention of emptying the neighbour's larder, and incidentally bouncing a large rock off his skull. For women are essentially unsocial. Perhaps one should use the more specific term "wives." An unmarried woman, be she maid or widow, is, of course, essentially social. She is a very whirlwind of social activity. For therein lies her hope of securing unto herself a more or less permanent mate. But once this is acquired, she sits down to watch him. She becomes the jealous watchdog of the heart, just as, in prehistoric ages, her wolf-pelt clothed sister stood ready to repel invaders in the affection of her lord with tooth and talon. And it is especially toward other ■ women that wives adopt this unsocial attitude. One can readily imagine Ug and Ik, long-armed, sinewy giants who had but lately battered each other with their , stone clubs, finally becoming good friends. One can hear Ug saying to his wife, "Do you know, my dear, that fellow Ik is really not a bad sort. We chased a diplosaurus fourteen miles this morning, and I got quite well acquainted with him. What do . you say to having them round to dinner some night?" And just as plainly, one can hear Mrs. Ug saying. "Have you seen her? Why, that Ik woman is impossible! She is wearing last year's lion skins, and looks I a fright. No, thank you." Is not this much the situation to-day? A Suburban Problem 11/TORE so than in flats or boarding- -•:*-*• house, it is when the newcomers remove to a suburban community that they find themselves up against a wall of exclusion, the breaching of which requires the utmost skill and patience. For here it is, in these congregations of homes, that we find woman's cruelty to woman displayed in its most subtle form. Man's entry into this new world is comparatively easy. If he is socially inclined, he meets his fellows at the golf club or the bowling green. If those more or less luxurious pastimes are not for him, he scrapes acquaintance on the 7.55 or whatever pet train or boat he peculiarly affects. He is soon calling them Bill or Jerry. He sits in a certain car, where he knows he will, each morning, find companions, friends! And all this is accomplished in a week or so. But his wife? Pursuing her isolated way through the suburban streets, she is the cynosure of all eyes, an object of suspicion, that pitiable creaturea strange woman. Does anyone extend a welcoming hand or call a greeting? No, no. The very houses seem suspicious. The day has C*. LIHJUOUHU \, J X-O, - O,*IAJ. JVU ±X»ULJ U\^ sure that Mrs. Thompson is never too busy with her jam-making to fail to note the passage of the stranger; Mrs. Smith, even- though she is polishing her own floor, does not miss

an item, of this fresh apparition. At the next' meeting of the Guild (a charitable'organisation) she will be appraised/ Her looks, clothes, gait, household, children and reputation will be added up ,in a column. The result will be against her. This is inevitable at first. She must be patient,- she must wait. Perhaps . . . . in time. .... The Guild referred to, being of a semi-religious nature, might be expected :to * open its arms with some cordiality to the newcomer, should she show a disposition to enlighten the South Sea Islanders with her needlework. She cannot be kept out, to be sure. But woe betide the illadvised lady who attempts to use the Guild as a social shoe-horn. Nothing, in fact, so tends to lengthen one's term of probation as an attempt to shorten it. There are other organisations, too, as a rule, into which the strange wife may creep timidly, but let her be careful to keep a civil tongue in her head; or it will be the worse for her. Even at church she should walk warily. Just because a lady kneels beside you is no sign that you are in her set. Here it is that the husband must show that he is the real moulder of public opinion. With the other husbands he is naturally all right, one of the clan, a blood brother. It is now up to him to meet a few of the wives, the established hierarchy. It used to be supposed that the wife did that sort of thing, and that her husband was brought out only on show occasions, but that day has passed. By dancing with the right people, by the occasional genial chat in the porch of the church, by a thousand subtle methods of ingratiation the husband is in a position to win that tolerance which is the first nick in the high wall which surrounds him and his family. If he be of gracious presence, as most husbands are, it is surprising what charming results can be attained in this way. Sometimes an actual call results from this method. Dont's for Wives 'T'HE wife, on her side, should play -*- the game with great care. A primary rule is that of avoiding any display of beauty. Some wives, even the wives of strangers, possess great personal attractions. We have all heard the expression "the fatal gift of beauty." Never is the gift more fatal than in the wife who stands on the outer threshold of a suburban set. To begin with, the men all notice it. Nothing so infuriates a wife. Even as Mrs. Ug spoke of Mrs. Ik do they assail this new menace. "You men are all alike," they say. "She is frightfully made up, and so common looking." No; if one would help some charming woman to a pleasant relation with her own sex, let him carefully refrain from praising her beauty. Let him criticise it, saying. "What a strange looking creature she is!" Ten to one. his wife will disagree with him. "I thought she was quite attractive." she will say. Even this cold championship is an entering wedge. On the whole, however, it is safer for the newcomer to disguise and conceal any beauty she may possess. Next to beauty, perhaps, brains are the most dangerous possession to introduce into a close corporation in the suburbs. By brains, one doesn't mean ordinary intelligence. That is naturally desirable; but care should be taken to keep it ordinary. Extraordinary brainsthe power to think, to do anything extraordinarily well—invariably creates distrust. Such people are regarded as queer. Brainy people usually do things different! from people without brains, and this puts them in the freak class.

This is a' fearful indictment, and very hard to live down. ' Brains, therefore, should be smuggled in, and carefully ■ concealed, until one's position" is firmly established. .; So with material possessions, or even the lack of them all display should be avoided. There are .young wives who make a boast of doing their own housework under the impression that it redounds to their credit. The more solid • ladies of the community draw away from these interlopers, with whom they cannot talk servants, because there aren't any. The most favourable mental attitude to be adopted should be that of careful, conventional concealment, showing on its surface no unusual features of any kind, but only the drab, regular outline of the great human average. Avoid eccentricity. Be banal. Be as average as possible. A Ruse r PHERE is more than one way to - 1 - skin a cat, or a community of cats. A lovely lady of the writer's acquaintance proved this by a clever scheme of her own. Relying on the deeply feminine trait of curiosity, she followed the famous Ghandi principle of non-co-operation. In other words, she just wouldn't play. She made no efforts to go anywhere, meet anyone, or join any feminine organisation. And whenever she went out of doors she was heavily veiled. Her face was a dark mystery. Who was she? What was she like? Have you ever met her? These questions were on every tongue. At last the good ladies of the district could not stand it any longer. They descended upon her in a body, consumed bv curiosity. They were surprised to find her charming, and lo! the day was hers.