Life — February 19, 1920 — page 21: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This illustration depicts two well-dressed women in an early 20th-century interior, with a small dog between them. The caption reads "Her One Regret at Leaving," suggesting a departure scenario—possibly a servant or employee leaving a household position. The satire appears to target class dynamics and sentimentality: the woman on the right (likely the employer) expresses regret at the departure, but her emotion is directed toward the small pet dog rather than the departing woman herself. This satirizes the irony of wealthy households valuing their animals over their domestic staff, suggesting that employers showed more affection to pets than to the working-class women who served them. The joke relies on the uncomfortable contrast between genuine concern and misplaced priorities.