Hot off the press -- Abby's new booklet, "The Anger in All of Us and How to Deal With It." To order, send a long, business-size, self-addressed envelope, plus check or money order for $3.95 ($4.50 in Canada) to: Dear Abby, Anger Booklet, P.O. Box 447, Mount Morris, Ill. 61054. (Postage is included.)
Wife Begs Man to Slow Down Before He's Stopped for Good
DEAR ABBY: My husband underwent multiple bypass surgery a year ago, and he's rapidly falling back into his old habits of working too long and too strenuously. I'm afraid he is soon going to be back to the state of health he was in when he got that heart attack.
He is in his late 50s and is still a workaholic. He is holding down two full-time jobs and, being the perfectionist he is, he tries to excel at both. Forget exercise. He has a stationary bicycle at the foot of his bed that he's had for two years, and it's as good as new.
The reason I'm writing is that some of my friends have told me that you had a poem in your column titled "Slow Me Down, Lord," and I would like to get a copy so I can have it blown up and framed and hung over his desk. He has promised that if I get it for him, he will read it every day and try to slow down. Please? -- "SKEETER" IN SOUTH CAROLINA
DEAR "SKEETER": The poem was written by Wilferd A. Peterson, and I hope your husband can slow down long enough to read it. And here it is:
SLOW ME DOWN, LORD
Slow me down, Lord!
Ease the pounding of my heart
By the quieting of my mind.
Steady my harried pace
With a vision of the eternal reach of time.
Give me,
Amidst the confusions of my day,
The calmness of the everlasting hills.
Break the tensions of my nerves
With the soothing music of the sighing streams
That live in my memory.
Help me to know
The magical resoring power of sleep.
Teach me the art
Of taking minute vacations of slowing down to look at a flower;
To chat with an old friend or to make a new one;
To pat a stray dog;
To watch a spider build a web;
To smile at a child;
Or to read a few lines from a good book.
Remind me each day
That the race is not always to the swift;
That there is more to life than increasing its speed.
Let me look upward
Into the branches of the towering oak
And know that it grew slowly and well.
Slow me down, Lord,
And inspire me to send my roots deep
Into the soil of life's enduring values
That I may grow toward the stars
Of my greater destiny.
DEAR ABBY: I must take exception to your response to Karen A. Tamura of Cerritos, Calif., concerning the Vietnam War.
You said that National Guard units fired into a group of peaceful demonstrators at Kent State University, killing four and wounding nine.
Mobs are seldom "peaceful." These "students" confronting the National Guard at Kent State that day in 1970 constituted a mob. Their zeal for a cause led them astray. Four had to die before reason regained the upper hand. They were armed with bricks, rocks and clubs, and were scarcely in a mood to exercise discretion. It is ever so easy, after the fact, to declare what was should not have been. -- ALLAN E. BOVEY, SPRINGFIELD, MASS.
DEAR ALLAN: Read on:
DEAR ABBY: For years I have fumed as I read the sob stories about the "peaceful anti-war demonstrators" at Kent State. I know Vietnam wasn't a popular war -- I hated it, too. It is too bad these demonstrators were killed -- but peaceful? NO!
1. These "peaceful" demonstrators burned the ROTC building.
2. These "peaceful" demonstrators had been ordered to leave, but refused.
3. These National Guardsmen were about the same age as the "peaceful" demonstrators. They were there obeying orders. Wouldn't you feel your life was threatened if you were a member of a small group facing a large crowd who was pelting you with stones and other missiles? Small wonder someone panicked and fired.
Everyone has heard about the "peaceful" demonstrators who were injured or killed, but the public has never heard about the guardsman who phoned his young wife and cried as he told her what he had seen, and who today, at age 48, still has problems as a result of what happened that day, and the subsequent questioning and harassment these innocent young men were subjected to because of the Kent State riots!
No, I wasn't there -- but my 22-year-old brother was an Ohio National Guardsman protecting his country, his state and the taxpayers' lives and property. -- HAD IT WITH KENT STATE IN OHIO
DEAR ABBY: Perhaps being attacked with bricks, bottles, etc., is a peaceful demonstration to you, but those 18-year-old guardsmen were scared into retaliation. Where, oh where, has the truth gone? -- PHYLLIS GOLLESLIN, MELBOURNE, FLA.
DEAR ABBY: The governor of Ohio did not send for the state National Guard because of "peaceful anti-war demonstrators" at Kent State in May 1970. Mobs of raging students were roaming the campus -- pillaging and burning everything in sight (including whole buildings). Local authorities were terrified and helpless. Blame the issuance of live ammunition to a group of frightened soldiers, completely inexperienced in mob control, who were being shouted at, spit on, or hit by bricks and rocks. These guardsmen were no older than the students.
Abby, please read current accounts (unbiased) before wrongfully reporting this terrible tragedy. -- DAVID PAIGE, PUYALLUP, WASH.
DEAR DAVID AND DEAR READERS: My source for the explanation of the Vietnam War and reference to Kent State came from the World Book Encyclopedia. I felt that this was an unbiased account, and it was in no way intended to mislead or inflame. Referring to it as a "peaceful" demonstration was my mistake. I now know the truth.
Most teen-agers do not know the facts about drugs, AIDS, and how to prevent unwanted pregnancy. It's all in Abby's new, updated, expanded booklet, "What Every Teen Should Know." To order, send a business-size, self-addressed envelope, plus check or money order for $3.95 ($4.50 in Canada) to: Dear Abby, Teen Booklet, P.O. Box 447, Mount Morris, Ill. 61054. (Postage is included.)
DEAR ABBY: Congratulations, you've done it again! You can now put another notch in your "success column" for Operation Dear Abby.
Last Thanksgiving, I wrote a letter to "Any Serviceperson" and sent it to the Persian Gulf as a part of your letter-writing campaign. I never really expected a reply, but I received one from a Lt. Patrick E. Fortune, which I answered promptly. We soon learned that we had a lot in common: His name is Patrick, my name is Patty; he's Irish-Catholic, I'm Irish-Catholic; he's one of seven kids, I'm one of seven kids; he went to an all-boys Catholic school, I went to an all-girls Catholic school; we both have dreamed of biking through Ireland. We also share many of the same beliefs about God, family and values.
When Pat returned to the states, we started talking on the telephone. We have had three- and four-hour long conversations. (Don't ask about our telephone bills!) I finally broke down and told him that I was absolutely nuts about him! He then confessed that he felt the same way about me.
We finally met in Cincinnati over the Labor Day weekend and had a sensational time. We knew there was no doubt about it -- we were right for each other.
Pat sent me a plane ticket so I could visit him at Fort Bragg, and our romance flourished. He will get out of the service in about six months, after which he plans to move to Milwaukee and make spoiling me a full-time job. That's wonderful because he's the most important person in my life.
So, Dear Abby, that's the saga of Pat and Patty. How can I ever thank you? -- PATTY TREACY, GREENFIELD, WIS.
DEAR PATTY: You just did.
DEAR ABBY: My best friend and I have been friends for 6 1/2 years. I am a single man who has never been married, and my best friend is a married woman with two children. Her husband's job allows him to be home only three nights a week. I even stay at her home about 50 percent of the time. Her husband has no objections to my staying in their home. In fact, we get along very well.
The problem is that everyone thinks it is abnormal for us to "hang out" as much as we do. We do not have sex, and never will; we are not attracted to each other sexually at all. We are just good friends and that's all.
So, what do you think, Abby? Is our relationship normal or not? I hope you will print this so our friends will know that two people of the opposite sex can be good friends -- and that's all. -- BUGGED IN BARSTOW
DEAR BUGGED: It is indeed unusual for a single man and a married woman who are not romantically involved to spend so much time together. It is also out of the ordinary for the woman's husband to be as secure and generous about his wife's close friendship with another man.
And yes, people of the opposite sex can be friends -- and that's all. It is not necessarily "abnormal," but it is unusual.
DEAR ABBY: I recently remarried. My new husband was also previously married. How should I introduce my first husband's relatives who are my former in-laws? I am very friendly with my ex-husband's nieces and nephews, too. -- SECOND TIME AROUND
DEAR SECOND: There is no reason to call attention to the fact that you were formerly related by marriage. Just introduce your ex-in-laws -- nieces and nephews -- as "dear" or "old" friends, and save the explanatory details for subsequent meetings.
Abby's family recipes are included in her cookbooklet. Send a long, self-addressed envelope, plus check or money order for $3.95 ($4.50 in Canada) to: Dear Abby, Cookbooklet, P.O. Box 447, Mount Morris, Ill. 61054. (Postage is included.)