Now We're Off To The City

Radio Record, Volume IX, Issue 2, 19 July 1935, Page 62

Now We're Off To The

City

provincial girl. She longs for an opportunity to break away from her humdrum life and get a post in a big city, where life, or so she imagines, is a continual round of pleasure and excitement, and where she can enjoy a glorious independence. . She pictures to herself a cosy flat, friends dropping in continually for delightful informal meals, and endless theatre parties and entertainments. So she dreams and plans with joyful anticipation-but how different is stern. reality. For the city, as far as the business girl is concerned, is a: series of hard facts, chief of which is that the newcomer will soon find she has very little time or money for the gaieties of which, she dreams, Few girls. just starting in town are able to furnish their own rooms, or even to pick and choose them. They must just take what they can afford, uswally’a cheap bed-sitting room in a suburban district. ~ Then there is the question of friends. Several attempts are being made to help solitary girls find suitable companionship, but we still hear of the terrible loneliness of countless girls who are on their own. A big city with its teeming thousands leaves Sar hee to their fate. Pies "TT live in the city" is the dream of nearly every

own cirele of friends, and office companionship often teases when the office door closes. Instead, therefore, of con gtantly playing hostess to | friendly callers, of enjoying frequent ‘theatre parties and | suppers, ete., our city fledgling sits alone night after night, longing for,some one to talk to; or in desperation visits 2 cinema; or goes for a solitary walk. Such a life is bad for any girl from. every, point of view.

It is much better for her to sacrifice her dreams of a flat of her own, and, go to a hostel or boardinghouse, where she will be sure of companionship and of some social intercourse. .A lonely life is neither a healthy nor a happy one. ‘Time _ enough to think of a flat when she has made ‘a circle of friends, and. perhaps found someone congenial to share a home life. with cher.

Most important of all is the problem -.o© money, tne one over «which so many’ business girls come disastrously to grief. Very: few of them, especially when they first leave home, have any real idea of, the cost of living. They plan an excellent budget "on paper," and eyen allow a fair. margin for incidentals, but they have been so accustomed to go to the family workbasket for sewing materials, to the family writing-table for notepaper-and stamps, and to various drawers for string and shoe polish, and so on, that they have no idea how the cost of these trifles mounts up. ;

As a girl said. to me-the other day, describing her efforts to make.ends meet, "I never realised what it would mean to buy ‘every bar of soap, every drop of ink, and every reel of cotton. At home ‘these things seemed to fall like manna. from jhéaven." Byven asking a friend to tea becomes 2 matter of money. At home it just meant an extra plate and.cup and saucer, but now. it means buying extra cakes and jam; and soon the most hospitable of girls pauses before issuing an invitation. She. has found out what it costs-and she has her laundry and.midday lunches, and her fares to-and from her work to consider, as well as other odds and ends that seemed sv trifling "on paper." She may be getting a bigger salary, but she will find her expenses more than doubled. She soon discovers she has little money for amusements, and als» not much spare time. ‘There are stockings to wash and clothes to mend, and ‘often she is too fagged to want to go out. She lives for Sundays, and spends most of them in bed. Yet for the girl who is really keen and hard-working, and anxious to get on, a business life in a city offers great. possibilities. But in order that some of her dreams may come true, she must be prepared to work hard and live quietly for the first year or two, leading a life that is probably as quiet:and-humdruni as that in any provincial office. ~