What kind of advice does Dorothy Dix have for thirtysomething women whose biological clocks are starting to tick very loudly? She weighs in on the subject in a column first printed November 2, 1940.
Dear Miss Dix - About once every five years I take a personal inventory to check up on development and progress, if any. Have just been doing this and realize with a shock that I am 33 years old and that if I ever wish to marry and have the normal life of a woman I must be up and doing. So far I have never been in love. Never thought of marrying. Have let two good chances pass me by because I have to support my mother, and lately an invalid sister who is divorced and has two children have been added to my burden. Now the next five years are very important if I am to marry, and I know that I do want to marry. I know that I am good wife material. Am affectionate, attractive, energetic, well read, and domestic. Can you suggest any way out for me, bearing in mind that there is no other revenue other than my salary coming into the house? I will appreciate any advice you can give me on how, when and where to snare the illusive male.
DOT.
So you have the ideal environment. You are casting your bait, so to speak, in a river that is full of suckers, but it is up to you to have enough skill and adroitness to hook your fish and land him. Nobody can teach you the trick.
You have to evolve your own craftsmanship, and apparently you have so far not taken the trouble to do it. You even scared off the two who came and nibbled at your line. So if you want to make your catch you will have to get busy. Thirty-three is getting along toward the deadline for fisherwomen.
I hate to be discouraging to any woman wanting a good husband, but, being a practical business woman yourself, you are bound to realize that your family is an almost insuperable handicap to you. Not many men in these days make enough money or are generous enough to marry a whole ready-made family and take on their shoulders the support of five people instead of one, as your husband would have to do.
Maybe there is some rich old man who would realize that a young, charming, interesting and domestic wife, such as you would be, is worth the price, but even if such a one should appear on the scene, would he be the Prince Charming you had always hoped to marry?
I think that nothing is more tragic than the fate of girls like you who would like to marry and who were intended by nature to marry and make some man happy, but who cannot do so because they are the family goats.
And I think that nothing is more cruel than the way in which families ruthlessly offer up these daughters, without a thought that they are making girls give up their lives for them.
Mothers who are perfectly capable of earning their own support settle down at 45 or 50 on Janey for the balance of their lives. Sisters and brothers demand that Janey work her fingers to the bones and do without everything she wants to send them off to college and give them good clothes, and then they marry without every repaying Janey a cent and go off about their own affairs and leave her to take care of Mother.
Why shouldn't Mother work if she is able to? Why shouldn't the sisters and brothers work their way through college if they are bound to go? Why shouldn't the sisters who lose their tastes for their husbands put up with them, as Janey does with her unpleasant bosses, instead of coming home with a houseful of children for Janey to support?
I am fed up hearing about parasitic families and I am hoping and praying that I will live to see the day when the nanny goats get up on their hind legs and stage a rebellion and refuse to furnish the sacrificial meat any longer. For why work when Janey provides a comfortable home and three square meals a day?
10 comments:
Wow. I had a female relative who stayed home (well, she had a day job) to take care of her father and almost grown brothers (until they were married). My mother told me that this female relative had been in love and wanted to marry, but had to choose between family (jerks!) and husband to be (double jerk). How cruel is that? (Because it made my mom so mad, she refused to see those men. So, I never met any of them.) Makes me weep thinking about it.
I always giggle when Ms. Dix goes off on her tangents. I wonder whatever happened to the writer, if she ever did get married or not. She's right though, not many men even now would want to enter into an arrangement like that of supporting her whole family, but of course these days she would probably continue working even after married.
If only 40's girl had EHarmony!
I confess, although I don't have to support my parents and brother, that this one made me pretty sad. Once again, women how have so many more choices, and 33 in 2010 is younger, in a sense, than 33 would have been in 1940. But this is one of those areas where wanting it badly and doing all you can to make it happen don't guarantee success.
Oh, I just ache for the letter writer this week. Ms. Dix is assuming she's working at some job where there are men galore --- but what if she's not? It's too bad she let the last two nibbles get away. Mom probably doesn't have marketable skills and sister's an "invalid." What to do? Unfortunately, the biological clock is one thing that hasn't changed since the 1940s and 33 is getting up there (speaking from the vantage of 36). I too wish we could know how this one turned out...
That's what I was thinking: If she's a nurse or something, there might not be many men around, and if she works long hours she won't have time to go out much.
My aunt (now in her 70s and never married) told me recently that she always knew it was her 'job' to be the one who stayed home (after my mom and uncle left to marry) to take care of her parents. She said it was the era she was raised in, she didn't consider it cruel, it's just 'what you did.' She was lucky and also taught so got out into the world. Both parents are dead now and she continues to be active in her community. Says she doesn't regret her life but I still wonder...
I guess in an era before most people had Social Security as income for their old age, aged parents - mothers in particular - expected to be supported by a child. And in small communities, a child (especially who didn't have a family of his/her own to support) would be treated disapprovingly by neighbors, etc.
I heart Ms. Dix for feeling this woman's pain and not writing her off.
Jitterbug-I sent your questions to your email, but wanted to make sure you got them. Maybe I sent them to the wrong place. If you are taking your time answering, then forgive my impatience, I just wanted to make sure you received them. I often agree wholeheartedly with Dorothy. I thought of you the other day because there was a Cole Porter song on and it mentioned Dorothy Dix in it, and I had to laugh.
Questions received! (Just checked my Gmail.) I'll start working on my answers and send them to you by reply...
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