Townsend Harris High School - Crimson Gold Yearbook (Flushing, NY)

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-In X I LITERATURE

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CRIMSON AND GOLD SORORAL lPRlEClEDlENClE fllyifzfzer of five Cl'fl7I.l'0iZ and Gold Short Story Cofzfeflj ALLAN I. RAD IN CHAPTER ONE. .5 HEN a son is born to parents QA? after a sister has preceded him t 'fe by several years, he is the vic- Neje tim of a terrible misfortune. fi- ,ig As may be naturally expected, 'jg A the son does not take any cog- nizance of worldly matters upon his natal day, but it takes comparatively little time for him to realize the irreparable injustice done to him. For the unfortu- nate thus afflicted there remains little but a complete resignation to his fate, and the fleeting sands of time, instead of healing the wound, only serve to increase the burden under which he labors. This injustice, then, may be termed sororal precedencew. The sister is in- variably a tyrant and a despot over all the younger members of the family, and where there is but one child, a son Qmay the gods of mercy take special notice of himj, the autocracy of her rule is greatly magnified because of the necessary con- centration upon a single object. From such female domination there is no means of escaping save to run away from home, and to the average youth this course would prove extremely impractical. There is no appeal, for never do parents fail to substantiate and sustain the words, deeds, and actions of the older branch of the family tree, and moreover, they em- phatically overrule the objections of the younger. Tragic indeed is such a situation. It is one of the most important phases of human life, yet authors have proved themselves oblivious to its existence. They have failed to observe the poor down-trodden youth,-or if they have, their readers have not been given the FRANK D. BRITZ benefit of their observations. While the author must, with all due modesty, dis- claim credit for making any discovery of magnitudinous import, he wishes to show the lack of literature about the youths in this world who have elder sis- ters, youths who can look forward to but one forlorn hope-the marriage of their sisters, for such an event marks a new era in their lives, the end of mis- ery and the commencement of self-domin- ation and freedom. But for those whose sisters embrace spinsterhood there are no words of condolence, no hopes to whose fulfillment they can look forward, noth- ing save occasional distraction and finally death. CHAPTER Two. Numbered thus among the most plagued of unfortunates was, Robert Greene. He had a sister, of course, who was, most unhappily, almost five years his senior. When he was younger, her special delight, it seemed to him, was to inflict corporal punishment and other physical discomfitures upon his person, not to mention the innumerable hours of mental tortures and anguish he suffered during the almost incessant exercise of her authority. Bob fonly his sister called him by his official appellationj had never appealed to his parents since he was seven, for he was thoroughly impressed by the futility of such action. Bob distinctly remembered the miser- able afternoon he had spent at Alice's birthday party when he was seven. From the outset of that memorable event he was unduly provoked by the fact that, to make the greatest possible allowances, his birthday parties were biennial, whereas those of his sister Alice occurred with Page F07'fj'-1lilI6