The Making of Americans, Being a History of a Family's Progress (80 page)

     As I was saying Martha when she was a young one was not really very interesting to any one who knew her then. She was until she was nearly, almost, a young woman of the feeling and the living of poorer people as I was saying, more than she was then of any other living. She was in her daily living of their living and their feeling as I was saying. This is now a little description of the feeling and the living she then had in her. She was always then as I was saying of the living and the feeling of the people, and the other people that knew them, of people in very small houses living near the Hersland family then. She was of their daily living then as I was saying. This is now a little description of what she knew with them and what she did not know with them then.
     As I was saying Martha Hersland was all through her younger living of the feeling and the living of, for her natural family living, poor people. She was of the daily feeling and the daily living of them more than she was of the daily feeling and the daily living of her family living and feeling. She was then as I was saying of the daily living and the daily feeling of the people near her who had in them as I said of them half city feeling and half country feeling. She was as I was saying as much as there was in her then of feeling and living of their feeling and their living. She was with them often in the evening, she was with them more or less in the day time, she was of their daily living and their daily feeling more than she was then of any other feeling or living. As I was just saying she was with them often in the evening when she was not any longer a very young one, she was with them then very much of the day-time, she was as I was saying of their daily living and their daily feeling almost all the daily living and the daily feeling there was in her then.
     She was with them as I was just saying often in the evening now that she was no longer a very little one and very much of the day-time. Some of them, the younger ones whom she knew then were beginning now to go out working and she saw them when they came back from their working and she was with them then and she was with them then again in the evening. As I have said almost all there was of daily living and daily feeling then in her was of the daily living and the daily feeling of these young people and their friends and relations and this was not very important to any one then that this was the daily living and the daily feeling of Martha Hersland then. Sometimes Mr. Hersland suddenly remembered that Martha should not go out in the evening, mostly he did not pay much attention to the daily feeling and the daily living in her then. Sometimes as I was saying he would suddenly remember she should not go out in the evening alone with these young people near them and then he would forbid her going and he would tell her that she should stay in the house and be with her mother and then he would lecture her brother that he did not take better care of his sister. “You have to take care of her sometime and you might as well begin, the sooner the better. You will have to do it sooner or later, I tell you.” “I'll take mine later” said the brother but he was careful that his father did not hear and he went out that evening as he did many evenings as I will be telling later in the long history of the living of him, but on that evening Martha Hersland could not go out to be with the others. Mr. Hersland's remembering that she should not go out in the evening did not happen very often. Mostly she went out in the evening and the day-time. Sometimes her father coming home from the city and seeing Martha standing in the yard of some of the small houses talking would get very angry that she was not at home studying. He could often get very angry and be full up with impatient feeling as I was saying whenever he remembered that Martha was his daughter and was not just what he would have her. At this time they had not any governess living in the house with them. Madeleine Wyman had left them and they had no governess after this one. Mrs. Hersland then did not have much meaning in the family living. She was weakening a little inside her then as I said when I was describing the living in her, she was lost then between her big children and the father of them as I was then saying then when I was describing the being in Mrs. Hersland. So then as I was just saying Martha was in her daily living and her daily feeling more of them the people in small houses near the Hersland family then than she was of any other daily living or daily feeling then. As I was saying she was with them often in the evening, as I was saying she was not then very interesting to any of them then. As I was saying the future which would be different for her in kind than the future of them made a separation between them in the things she was knowing with them and the things they were knowing among them, in the things she was feeling with them and the things they were feeling among them, in the things she was doing with them and the things they were doing among them, in the way she was interesting to them and the way they were interesting to each other among themselves then. As I was saying all there was of daily living and daily feeling in her then was of the daily feeling and daily living they had among them. As I was saying in a way she was separated from them, though all the living and feeling she had in her then was the living and feeling she had from them, by the future living that would be different in her living from the future living any of them would naturally be having.
     As I was saying she was then not really very interesting to any one. She might have been a little interesting a couple of evenings to Harry Brenner but she never really was interesting to him.
     As I was saying she was then of their daily living and their daily feeling, the poorer people near them, and she was with them a good deal in the day-time and she was with them very often in the evening. As I was saying sometimes her father remembered that she should not be out with them in the evening and he would forbid her going out that evening and he would lecture her brother Alfred because he did not take care of his sister who should not go out in the evenings in the way she was doing and the father was full up then as I was saying with impatient feeling and then that would be the end of his interfering with Martha's daily living and daily feeling and Martha's going out in the evening. The mother Mrs. Hersland was then as I was saying in the history of her living lost then among her children and the father of them. Always then in her young living Martha was of them the people near them and this was of her until she was almost a young woman.
     As I was saying she was of them the poorer people in her daily living and in her daily feeling, as I was saying she was not so interesting to any of them as they were to each other then and this was mostly because of the future living there was for her in her and a little perhaps from the way being was in her but mostly it was from the future living of her that was naturally to be different from that of those she was then knowing. As I was saying she was not so interesting to any of them as they were to each other then and she was not feeling and living and understanding anything really in the way they were doing then. As I was saying she almost might have been interesting to them from her almost being interesting a couple of evenings to Harry Brenner who was one of them but she did not come to be really interesting to him. Perhaps it was the future living in her that made her not come to be really interesting to Harry Brenner then although there was almost a beginning of being interested in him. That was the end of it though then, she never as I was saying was really interesting to any of them then.
     So then this was the being, the living, the feeling, the understanding in Martha Hersland up to her almost being a young woman this that I have been describing. Her father as I was saying had many ideas about her education and then he had impatient feeling in him that she was not the kind of daughter he had wanted to have as a daughter to him. The mother as I was saying then had only a dim feeling then of the being, and the living, and the feeling there was then in her children. Things were a little dim in her then but to herself then she and they and the father of them were still then of the living that was the natural living for them. To herself inside her they were never at any time neither she nor her husband nor her children nor their family ever really cut off from the living that was the natural living to them. Really she was then lost among them, that was the real being in her then, really the being in herself and in her husband and her children was really then a very dim thing to her then but always there was in her the feeling as I was saying of being in herself and in her husband and her children part of the well to do living which was the natural being for her, the only being she ever had had, to her feeling, in her.
     So then as I was saying Martha Hersland in her daily feeling, in her daily living was of the daily living and the daily feeling of the people living in small houses near the Hersland family then living in the part of Gossols where no other rich people were living. Her father as I was saying was of their daily living and their daily feeling too somewhat then and on Sundays when he walked and stopped to talk to them and sat down in the houses with the women when they were cooking and ate something there in the kitchen with them and felt inside him a feeling that they were women there in a room with him. Then it was to him a good thing, then when he had this kind of feeling of them the women in him, then he thought and said it was a good thing Martha should learn how to do things, cooking and sewing and living and feeling like the women he was seeing then having as women in him to him, then when he was sitting with them in the kitchen or sometimes in their little gardens. Then he said Martha should learn the living they had in them, and he said it to them and then he said it to Martha when he saw her. This was one way he had of feeling about her being of the daily living and the daily feeling of these people living near them. Then sometimes of an evening as I was saying he would see Martha leaving the house and he would suddenly remember then she should not go out of an evening, that was no way a daughter of his in his position should he acting and then he would tell her he would see to it that she should stay home and he would employ some one to look after her and make of her the kind of educated person that it was right he should have for a daughter. And so as I was saying Martha Hersland until she was almost a young woman was in her daily living and in her daily feeling of them the people living in the small houses near the ten acre place where the Hersland family were living then and she was with them and in the houses of them a good deal in the daytime and she was a good deal with all of them in the evenings in the later part of her young living and as I was saying she was not really then interesting to any of them and as I was saying she was not then really feeling and really living and really understanding the living and the feeling that they had together then amongst them. This was the daily living and the daily feeling in Martha Hersland and the being in Martha Hersland this that I have been just describing when it came that she had an awakening into realler feeling and then she came to have a real attacking moment and it lasted to her beginning her university education. This is now a little description of this in her.
     As I was saying she had a being in her that was mostly in a condition always all her living of being in a state of confusion inside her. This gave to her always very much nervous being in her, this made her to every one often very stupid in resisting and very slow in beginning and very foolish in not remembering anything that she should have been learning in her living. This will come out very clearly in the description of her living with her husband and then later with her father after she had come back to live with him after all the trouble she had in her living. It will come out very clearly then the being in her, the confusion always in her that made her to every one knowing her mostly always very stupid in resisting and really very slow and yet very jerky and unexpected in beginning and very foolish in not remembering what having been experiencing something any one would have supposed she would have been really learning.
     Now there will be a little more description of her daily living, of the living and the feeling of the living and the feeling of the people in the little houses near the Hersland family then in her young living and the ending in her of this living and this feeling.
     The kind of being she had in her I have already a little been describing, the kind of a whole one that she was and the nature and the kind of way her being was active in her. There has been too a little description of how much she had heard and how little she knew in living. As I was saying she was not then really very interesting to any one. No one knew anything very much then of what she was feeling about anything then and she did not know what she felt then about anything in living and nobody knew what she felt then about living and really she did not clearly then feel anything.
     This was the way she was then when one day when she was alone in another part of the town where she had gone to take a lesson in singing she saw a man hit a woman with an umbrella, and the woman had a red face partly in anger and partly in asking and the man wanted the woman to know then that he wanted her to leave him alone then in a public street where people were passing and Martha saw this and this man was for her the ending of the living I have been describing that she had been living. She would go to college, she knew it then and understand everything and know the meaning of the living and the feeling in men and in women. She would go to college and she told it then to her father and her mother and they had no objection, no one was paying very much attention and she began her preparation and she came to know some other young girls and young boys, not rich ones like those it was natural she should then be knowing but more of her natural kind than any she had known before in her living. One of them John Davidson she knew very well then and he and she played music and sang together and then she was ready and then she went to college for more education. This is to be now more history of, in her, the ending of her older young living and her subsequent going to college and of the man she met there and who there married her.