The Making of Americans, Being a History of a Family's Progress (41 page)

     After she had to give up the dress-making, after she had used up all the money she had saved for that undertaking she had in her almost a despairing feeling, not anything of an anxious feeling, a little impatient feeling, nothing then of an angry or injured feeling. She had not then as I was saying anything of an anxious feeling, she was always certain of being able to earn a living, she had no fear in her in living, she had a despairing feeling for the loss of freedom and possible success and distinction, she had an impatient feeling, not altogether an irritable feeling, it was more in the nature of a purely impatient feeling because she had to go back to taking care of children.
     This altogether made in her something very nearly a despairing feeling in her. She was then as I was saying still living with Mabel Linker. She had not yet found a position but this was not then worrying her, she knew she could always earn a living, she had in her then her kind of despairing feeling. Mabel Linker was earning then enough to support herself and her. This is now what happened to both of them.
     Mary Maxworthing as I was saying was really whatever any one who knew her thought her and yet she now had something happen to her that surprised every one who knew her.
     She had as I was saying in her then a kind of a despairing a little an impatient feeling, she had no really anxious or excited or fearful being then in her, she knew she could always get a good place for people always wanted her. She was then as I was saying not a very young woman. For the rest of the summer she finally began working in a store near her, then later she got a good position as nursery governess and everything was satisfactory to her. Mabel Linker was working then in the beginning of winter around in houses sewing but she expected soon to begin again working for herself, it was she now who had a chance in her of a future. Mary Maxworthing said nothing then of working with her. One day Mary Maxworthing took a day off to go to the hospital to see a doctor. She went alone not even Mabel Linker was with her.
     As I was saying Mary Maxworthing was what every one thought her. Every one had about the same estimate of her. Something happened to her that surprised every one who knew her, surprised them that it should happen to her.,
     Mary Maxworthing had not any recklessness or wildness in her. She had very little weakness in her. She had a certain ambition a certain desire for freedom and distinction. She had no anxious being or fear in her, she had not very strong desires in her, she had a certain gayety in her, she had a reasonable sense of responsibility inside her, she had a certain delicacy and good sentiment in her, she was what every one who knew her thought her. She had a little impatient feeling in her.
     She went in to the doctor, the doctor asked her a few questions and then examined her, “you know what':, the matter with you", he said to her. She grew red, she had a little impatient feeling in her, she had no fear in her and no angry feeling in her. “I don't know what's the matter with me Doctor,” was her answer.
     She had I was saying never any anxious feeling in her, she never really had any fear in her. She did have a little impatient feeling always in her. She had had after the failure of her undertaking a little of a despairing feeling. Now she did not have this in her. When the doctor said that to her she had no fear or anxious being in her, she grew a little red, she had a little nervous impatience then in her. “You know what's the matter with you!” said the doctor. “I don't know what's the matter with me,” was her answer. The doctor was a young man, he grew angry and he told her. She grew redder, she had more impatient feeling in her but she had very little shame or anxious feeling in her, she had a little more impatient feeling in her. “You'd better get him to marry you,” said the doctor who was angry with her.
     It is very interesting that every one has in them their kind of stupid being. It is very important to know it in each one which part in them; which kind of feelings in them is connected with stupid being in them. Sometime there will be a history of every kind of stupid being in every kind of human being in every part of the history of each one from their beginning to their ending.
     There is then stupid being in every one. As I was saying Mary Maxworthing had very little stupid being in the bottom in her being, her stupid being was mostly mixed up with her impatient being with her possible angry or injured feeling. The doctor was angry at her saying that she did not know what was wrong with her, he thought it was stupid bottom being in her or a way of deceiving in her, it was the stupid being in her that went with the impatient being in her. Sometime this will be clear in her. The doctor then was angry with her, “you know what is the matter with you!” he said to her.
     She did not then say anything farther, she was not interested in what the doctor had further to say to her. It was of no importance to her. She had then finished the stupid being in her that went with the impatient being in her. She was through with being stupid in that kind of way of not knowing whether it had really happened to her. Later impatient feeling stupid being would be again in her, this will show in the later history of her but now she knew what was the matter with her; she went home and it got told to Mabel Linker. It was told to Mabel Linker, Mary Maxworthing told it very directly to her, “I don't care I want a baby, so much the worse for me getting it in this way but I want it anyway.” Mary said this always after she had told her.
     Mary Maxworthing then had a baby in her, it had happened to her and it was a surprise to every one who knew her who learned it about her. It was the very last thing any one would have expected to happen to her. One would have thought surely Mary Maxworthing would make a man marry her before such a thing would happen to her. It was a surprise to every one who knew her. But she was always then the same that every one thought her only, as she said, alright there is nothing to say about it, it had happened to her. That was the end of the fact for her, that was not the end of the trouble for her, that was the end of the fact for her. As I was saying Mary had stupid being in her connected in her with the impatient feeling she had in her, with the injured feeling she could have sometime in her. She had no stupid being as a bottom to her, by and by this will be clearer. Mabel Linker had a hard time taking care of her. Gradually the people who employed her knew what had happened to her. They were surprised too that it could happen to her, she said nothing to explain how it had happened, she said, alright it has happened and she liked children and now she would have one. There was no hardness in her, there was then no really anxious being in her. It had happened and that was the end of that matter to her. Soon every one who knew her had the same feeling about what had happened to her. Every one continued to have the same opinion of her whether they liked her or whether they did not like her as they had had before this happened to her, then every one who knew her had still the same estimate of her.
     She was then without real anxious feeling, the people who employed her were patient with the impatient being then in her. Mabel Linker took good care of her and stood all the impatient being then in her, the impatient being that was stupid being then in her, the impatient being that was irritating then in her to every one near her, the impatient being that made her very interfering and rather nagging.
     This is now a history of what now happened to her and how Mabel took care of her, and of Mabel Linker and how they did and did not get along together, and what each one of them felt about the other.
     Mary Maxworthing and Mabel Linker were from the same part of the country. They had always known each other. Mary was the elder. Mabel was about five years younger. Mabel Linker's cousin had married Mary Maxworthing's sister. Mary Maxworthing had always known Mabel Linker and had always been very fond of her. When Mabel came to Gossols to learn dress-making Mary almost idolised her. They were then always together, Mabel then always did what Mary told her. Mabel was then a stranger, Mary Maxworthing had already been in Gossols many years then and she took care of her. They got along very well together. As I was saying Mabel learned cutting and fitting and soon became very clever almost brilliant in dress-making, she had not the sense for fashion, she had not the sense for managing, she had very little sense about anything, she had to have some one to do directing and Mary Maxworthing did this for her in the beginning completely to Mabel's satisfaction. Satisfaction is not the right word for describing Mabel's feeling. In Mabel satisfaction was the not being aroused to escaping or resisting or in fact to any conscious feeling. Anyway they got on then very well in living and dress-making. Mary then had very little impatient being, her impatient being had then nothing nervous in it, not that she ever came to be a nervous person, her impatient being was not then too interfering and then too at that time she had for Mabel almost an idolising feeling. She liked to write down when she was sitting idling, “Mabel is an angel, angel Mabel,” and this showed her feeling. She wrote this down with a pencil whenever she was sitting doing nothing, this was in the beginning when Mabel was learning dress-making, when they were first living together.
     It was much harder to know it about Mabel Linker what feeling she had in her about any one around her. It was always very hard to know this about her. Perhaps she did not mostly have any very strong feeling in her. It was very hard to know it about her. When she had a lover it was then certain that she was crazy to have him marry her, she only lived in having him want her. Mostly with every one else around her one never could tell what was the feeling in her. They got along then very well as I was saying when they first began living together.
     Mabel then had become a good dress-maker, Mary had put together money enough and they began then their working together. At first things went pretty well and then they had some trouble living together and they had not then enough money to go on waiting for a future. They kept on however for some time living together.
     Mary Maxworthing did not have in her really an unpleasant nature, she did not really have in her a nagging temper. She had very little in her of anxious being or attacking feeling that makes unpleasant nature. She had in her very little nervous character, she had in her a little impatient feeling, she had a pleasant gayety in her. Her stupid being and her interfering never came from anxious being in her, they were not really unpleasant nature in her, they came from the little impatient being in her and the fact that she had not a very large bottom in her to her, she had a little sensitive bottom in her, a very little weakness as a bottom to her, almost no stupid being as a bottom to her, she had enough sensitiveness in her to make a pleasant sympathetic sweetness in her, she had very little fighting or attacking in her; all the unpleasant and stupid being in her was with the little impatient feeling always in her, with the angry and injured feeling sometime in her. This is a history of how she and Mabel Linker did and did not get along together. Mabel had a very different nature.
     There are many ways then that people have affection in them, there are many ways of having feeling about people near one. Each one then has their own way of having affectionate feeling in them. Every one has their own kind of affectionate being. Mary Maxworthing had her way of feeling about Mabel Linker, Mabel had her own way of having loving feeling. In every one there is their way of having in them affectionate feeling. In every one there is changing. Mostly every one has changing in them in their feeling about any one. Mostly every one never thinks about the changing the other one may be having in them. This is another matter though and now this is a history of the affectionate feeling and loving feeling Mary Maxworthing and Mabel Linker had in them and how each one affected the other one of them. As I was saying in the beginning Mary had for Mabel almost an idolising feeling, no one knew very much about Mabel Linker's feeling.
     Mary had for Mabel then at first almost an idolising feeling. Mabel had a quality of brilliant dress-making, and sweetness in enduring, and no certain expression of her feeling, and a certain freedom in doing that looked like courage in her living but was only that she never saw anything except the thing that then filled her, she never had any reflection in her, she had a certain shrinking fear sometimes in her but that was only when somebody stopped her, she had a certain flighty freedom in her, she was almost a brilliant dress-maker. She never had any ideas in her, she had not much sense of fashion in her, she had not such sense in her but that was not necessary for her, Mary Maxworthing would run her, when she first lived with her Mary idolised her. As I was saying the failure of the undertaking was to Mary Maxworthing a loss of freedom, a loss of future distinction. Mabel had very little of this feeling, she had not much more freedom working with Mary Maxworthing than in any other kind of working, not that she did not like it better, she liked it better but the failure did not make all the difference to her. Later it went better because then she had a husband to urge her. But this is all history that will be written later. Always later although they stayed together it was not as it had been earlier, it was not then an idolising of her by Mary and a yielding by her because she had no way to resist her.
     Freedom then in Mary Maxworthing was having her own choice in living, having some distinction. Freedom for Mabel Linker was loving one man and marrying him and working only under driving. She was brilliant then in working but she needed urging, she needed always some one else's starting. She had sensitive being in her to the point of creation, she was not of the kind of women that have instrument nature in them, she never did any one else's living, she always did her own living, when she loved her own loving, when she worked her own brilliant working, but always she needed other people to keep her going, to start her, to arrange for her, to hold her down when flightiness seized her; she always lived her own life in living, she needed other people to start her, to give a beginning idea to her, she needed other people to arrange for her, to hold her when flightiness was in her. She had no fighting in her, she had very little sense of escaping in her, she had some stubborn being in her, when she seized a thing she needed in loving or living nothing could pull it away from her. She needed very few things so much that no one could take them from her, she had no sense in her, generosity had no meaning to her she would give anything to any one even when they did not ask her, she held on only to the thing in living that was life to her, she had not any strong feeling about anything except the man she needed for loving, the man she married and who was everything to her, everything else could slip away as it would from her. This made an ingrate of her, she had no sense of any one ever doing anything for her for she had no need in her, they did it she never felt anything about it in her, that made trouble for her later, that made it later hard for Mary Maxworthing to forgive her, this is a history of the trouble it made for her. She had independent dependent nature in her but the dependent side of it in her to the point of sometimes exquisite creation was the whole of her. She had none of the independent side of it in her, she had no attacking in her. Stupid being in her was a negative thing in her, she had no sense for ordinary living in her, she had no sense of anything that was happening to her, she had not enough of anything in her beside the sensitive creation that was her to make any sense in her, this was the stupid being in her; that which was not in her was the stupid being of her, this made in her a lack of understanding and of living, it made an ingrate of her, it made very often a foolish person of her. Often it not being there made her flightiness control her, those who were not ever much interested really in her always said of her it was foolishness, silliness always in her, those who took a real interest in her said she had craziness in her. She had independent dependent nature in her and the sensitive dependent side of it in her to the point of exquisite creation was the whole of her. This is now a history of her, of her loving, of her marrying, of her dress-making, of her living with Mary Maxworthing.