The reason I married was that I was out of work. I answered an advertisement for a situation, and the proprietor asked me “if I was married.” I told him no, that I was single. Then he said: “Well, I’d give you the position at once, only I must have a married man.” I said: “Keep the place open for about an hour, and I’ll fix that all right—it’s easier to get married than it is to get a job.”
There’s no trouble in getting married at all; the trouble starts after you are married—when you have to get up in the middle of the night and walk the floor with Reginald singing coon songs; that is, Reginald does not sing coon songs—you’ve got to sing to Reggy; and you can’t sing a lullaby, or you’d go to sleep yourself.
Why, I had an awfully hard time getting used to it; the kid used to cry so much that it wouldn’t even stop for meals. The neighbors all said: “O, my! why don’t you feed that baby on Mellin’s food? It would make a different child of him.” I didn’t say a word to anyone, but went out and bought eight watermelons and five cantaloupes and then I fed him till I thought he’d bust. Well, after the doctors brought him to, he was a different child; they asked me why I didn’t feed him on cucumbers and sliced tripe.
Of course, after that experience I knew better. So I got a box of the true article at the druggist’s, and took the baby on my knee to feed him. The directions said: “Before feeding the baby, shake well.” Well, that was pie for me, because I had it in for him, anyway. I nearly shook the life out of him; then I fed him.
“Before feeding the baby, shake well.”
I was overly anxious to follow the directions strictly to the letter, so I read the whole thing through two or three times to make sure. Down near the bottom it read: “N. B.—After child is fed—set in a cool place—” I put him in the ice-box.
I went home the other evening and my wife said: “Ed, you know that this is the night that we are to go to the swell reception given by the Richmonds.” I said: “Yes, dear, I remember.” I hadn’t given it a thought, but I wasn’t going to tell her that. Then she came over and put her arms around me and started to cry. I asked what the trouble was, and she said: “Well, you know, dear, I only intended getting just a light dinner, because, you know, we’ll get plenty to eat at the reception.” Then I lied again and said: “Yes, I know.” “Well,” she went, on, “the cook has allowed what little we were going to have to burn, and now there isn’t a thing in the house fit to eat. But don’t scold,” she said, “for she is so young and inexperienced, and, besides, she’s so sweet; won’t a kiss do instead?” I was pretty hungry, but I said: “All right; send her in.”