why are men?

Rose Wilder Lane wrote this in January 1915...

"Why," said the woman with the interrogative eyebrows. "Why will men, who love a smoke more than mother, home or heaven: who are gloomy, morose, unhappy and ill if they haven't a small bonfire going in the corner of their mouth, why will they NEVER have a match on their persons?

"Why will men whose feet are the largest and unlovliest parts of their anatomy, plainly suited for use and not for ornament, fidget and frown and fuss until they get those feet on the desk before them, screening the whole of a new fifty-dollar tailored suit?

"Why will men, seized with a sudden panic of neatness on beholding a house shining with cleanliness, carefully put all the cigar ashes under the pillow when they lie smoking in bed, and conceal the burnt matches inside the pillow cover?

"Why will they furtively slip Nick Carter novels under the bathtub, from whence they can be coaxed only with grappling hooks and lyings on one's tummy?

"Why will men go in to a cigar shop to buy cigars and remain there to shake dice for boxes of candy that they do not want and cannot give away, and then smile superiorly at women's shopping?

"Why will men marry the women they do and then wish they were the women they aren't?

"Why will men boast that their wives have an equal checking power against the bank account and add triumphantly that the said wives haven't the faintest idea how to draw a check, and then pat themselves on the back for being model husbands?

"Why will men say proudly that in thirteen years of married life they have had occasion only twice to assert their authority and really reprove their wives, and believe it a signal proof of model husband-ness, instead of a well-nigh superhuman self-control on the part of the wives?

"Why will men laugh at women's styles and at the same time wear green hats with crushed silk bands and peacock feathers in back? In short, why ARE men, anyhow?

Appreciating the value of a climax, or being short of breath, the woman of the interrogative eyebrows stopped.

"The woman with the ever-ready answer took up the conversation. "Because," she said.

Labels: laura ingalls wilder

- posted by pioneergirl at 9:36 PM