Soupy stuff

Should men always be the first ones to express their feelings? I mean, don't women have mouths? Can't they speak? What happens to their prozed possessions of modesty, demureness and reserve when they so assiduously discuss threadbare the next lady's dresses, boyfriends and affectations? I know that Nature decreed the male of the species to woo the female with his antics, but humans never quite followed Nature's laws, did they?

About a year ago I was reading "Vanity Fair" by W.M. Thackeray. It was getting heavy and dreary as the end neared with no evident development in the plot. The clumsy Major William was still grovelling before the beautiful Amelia with Becky joining her and all pointing to a status quo climax, when comes the stroke of a genius, becoming of a great writer like Thackeray - rejection of Amelia by William! "No, you are not worthy of the love which I have devoted to you ...... you couldn’t reach up to the height of the attachment which I bore you, and which a loftier soul than yours might have been proud to share". Those words made me so happy that I stopped reading the book and walked around smiling to myself! Sometimes we don't realize the value of something we have in our possession until it is gone, gone forever beyond our reach. Nothing in this world is ideally elastic -- beyond a point plasticity sets in and the break is not very far. Never stretch things too far, even if it is love.

Why all this sermon crap now? I am reading 'The Scarlet Pimpernel' wherein the heroine Marguerite reminds me a little of Amelia Sedley. I've just reached the point where she tries to win her husband back with teary protests and sobbing entreaties on the night of the Grenville's Ball. Ah some women -- what high pedestals they climb only to come crashing down!