Life — March 15, 1923 — page 6: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

LIFE = March Lay late, pondering this 108 and that, and when I be- thought me how my friend Marge Boothby grows daily in my esteem, despite my having known her intimately for twelve years, I deemed it a pleasant thing to ring her up and tell’ her so. Whereupon she questioned me strangely and appeared shortly at my house with but poor excuse for her presence at that hour. And I do be- lieve she feared I had gone daft or taken to drugs or some such thing. Lord! civilization has come to a pass where one who acts upon a kindly impulse is at once suspected of knavery or lunacy. But I said naught to Marge, and made her stop to luncheon, whereat we ate heartily of creamed chipped beef and baked potatoes, a combination we both like immoderately. And when Marge did ask me if a certain youth unknown to her were handsome, I found sud- denly that I had no set standards for judging masculine beauty and was at a loss to reply. So I asked her, What do you mean by handsome? Like Rodolph Valentino? and she an- swered, My God, no!... This night I did see for the fifth time “Liza,” the colored dancing show, and found it as stimulating to my spirits as ever. March Feeling in a noble mood, 11th to a symphony concert (Lord’s Day)this afternoon, but the program was dull, and I could not but wish that the players would burst into a rousing jazz, as they will be doing in ten or twenty years, for I do hold with Carl Van Vechten, the critick, that the day will come when the Philharmonic will have “Every- body Step” in its repertoire. And why not? The music of men like Berlin, Hirsch and Gershwin is not only characteristic of our nation but perfect of its kind, a point which Eu- rope already grasps enthusiastically. . . To us at teatime came Amy Ord- way, swathed in weeds and so full of unctuous details as to her father’s death and inter- ment that it was plain she had en- joyed the obsequies thoroughly, de- spite her protestations of bereave- ment. . . .Weighing myself this day, I find that I have lost ten pounds since the first of the month, for which I thank God. March Louisa Blair to luncheon 12th | With me and she did ask me at least twelve times if I liked the gowne she was wear- ing, causing me thereby to lie a doz- en times instead of once. Lord! what a lightweight! And, though I be no Pallas Athena myself, I-do thank the gods for putting more than one track in my mind. I suppose they felt, after finishing Louisa’s fine, ——_~ \ feo “A fine stenog you are! Call yourself a typist and don’t know straight nose and wavy hair, that her need of wits was negligible. . . . All evening at cards, and so to bed. But I slept ill, for I did mark a great crack in the ceiling over my bed and feared for its descent in the night. And I did try to fix my mind on the philosopher’s injunction to be uncon- cerned about death, inasmuch as when death is, man is not, and when man is, death is not. Even so, the idea of being rescued from the ruins of my own dwelling is distastefu! to me. B.L The Crowning Sacrifice i} O please the kindly rector I’ve shunned all worldly ways And worn ill-fitting sackcloth For forty lagging days. I locked away my meerschaum With features grim and set, And sealed with sad reluctance My smiling cellaret. I gave up bridge and dancing, The ballet I forswore, I gave up plays and rated The opera a bore. Then as a capping climax (If one may call it that) I gave up fifty dollars For Emma’s Easter hat. how to put a ribbon in a typewriter.” “Does Paderewski know how to tune a piano?” comicbooks.com