p. 10 | SOCIETY by Mary Wood-Allen

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jun 17, 1903

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 29, No. 24.

SOCIETY.

By Mary Wood-Allen

Founding a Home.

[[FIGURE]] SOME years ago I stopped at a so-called family hotel which a number of young married people made their abiding-place. The men were away all day at business, while the women had nothing to do but shop, visit, play cards, or make fancy work. In this life of elegant leisure they doubtless thought themselves more fortunate than the young wives who, in obscure homes, were cooking, scrubbing, and washing dishes, but they were mistaken. They were contributing nothing to the welfare of humanity, while the obscure housewife in her round of simple, homely duties is not only making her family comfortable, but is building into the fabric of national character the virtues of thrift, industry, order, and loving service.

Housekeeper Versus Home-maker.

It may seem a very small thing when two young people set up a little unpretentious home of their own, but, in truth, it is a deed of national importance. The housewife may well "magnify her office," for she is the teacher in the great school which determines the characteristics of the nation; and well it is for the nation when she is home-maker as well as housekeeper, for there is sometimes a difference. All housekeepers are not home-makers, indeed may be far from it. House-keepers are too often "ridden by things," as Emerson says. The house takes precedence of the family, and ease, comfort, and happiness must be sacrificed to order. The home-maker may not be the most perfect housekeeper, but, with her, souls take precedence of things, and she is willing to endure a little wholesome disorder in order that home shall be the place where the family desire to stay. The housekeeper is restless and unhappy if there is an unwashed dish or an undusted room in the house; but the home-maker, loving neatness equally well, is willing to postpone the duties for a chat or a ride with her husband. Said a housekeeper to a home-maker, "My husband wanted me to go out into the country with him yesterday right after dinner, and I wanted to go so badly, but I couldn't, for the dinner dishes must be washed, you know, even if the heavens fall."

"No, I don't know," said the home-maker. "I know that I should have covered up the dishes and have gone and spent a golden afternoon with my husband out in the pure, country air, and I shouldn't have thought of the dishes all the time."

"Well, I haven't such an easy conscience," said the housekeeper with a tone of superior virtue. "I believe a woman's first duty is to her home."

"So do I," said the home-maker, "but the house is not all there is of the home. Husband and children come first, after them the house, and if their happiness or welfare demand a sacrifice of 'things,' then 'things' shall go." The home-maker must judge of relative values. She must be able to decide whether the care of the house is the paramount thing, or whether it is best, in the truest interests of home, to shut the eyes to some things that would offend the housewifely instincts and keep the family close around her and happy. Too often children are driven out of the house because they bring in their childish dirt and disorder, and later they stay out because they have found some place more attractive, and the mother sits in her orderly room alone and broken-hearted.

The Husband's Share.

The home is woman's especial domain, and fortunate is she if she had some training in its management. But the man has also a share of the responsibility of home-making. To many men getting married is little more than change of boarding-house. They have been boarding with one landlady at so much per week. Now they have another landlady whose entire expense they bear. They come to the home to eat, sleep, and read the paper, and to criticize the management perhaps, and that is all the responsibility they feel. Business occupies them. The wife has no share in that. Home occupies her, why should he be burdened with its care? This is not a true division of interests. The wife should know about the business and be interested in it according to her ability. The husband should know about the home and manifest his interest by helpful deeds. He can not be a part of the home if he is only a boarder.

One bright spring morning a woman arose at 6 o'clock, built a fire, pumped water, swept the porch, without having time for more than a fleeting glance at the glories of the new day. She fried potatoes, made coffee, cooked steak, and walked a weary way across the large kitchen from pantry to dining-room as she arranged the morning meal. When all was done she rang the bell, and her husband came down stairs, bright and genial, and in good fellowship with the world. He ate with a vigorous appetite, while the wife leaned her pale face upon her hand and said she could not eat, she was not hungry. The man looked at her uncomprehendingly. He did not understand how she could feel so. He was troubled and set about in his mind to find a remedy. It was soon found. "What you need," he said, "is exercise. If you would walk a mile before breakfast it would give you an appetite. It always does me." This was a well-meaning husband, but he did not realize his part in the home-making. To the wife should not be left all the toil, all the anxiety, with no one to give a thought to her, or lift a helping hand. If this husband, with his surplus of vigor, had arisen first, made the fire, pumped the water, swept the porch, and taken a few of the steps needed in setting the table, the wife would not have exhausted her entire strength in preparing a breakfast for him to eat alone. Indeed, after a few mornings of such assistance, he would perhaps have seen the necessity of a new pump; would have made a rolling table which, carrying all at once the articles needed in the dining-room, would save miles of travel in the course of a year; and best of all, he might have been awakened to the needlessness of such an elaborate breakfast, and would have put in a plea for simple fare involving less labor for the housekeeper, and in reality promising more of health for the family. Well would it be, not only for individuals but for the nation, if a simpler home life could prevail; if we could come to feel that life is not merely eating, drinking, and sleeping; it is thinking lofty thoughts; it is having time to commune with God and each other; and home is the place where the sweet joys of loving service are to be felt in their greatest perfection.