Beautiful Girlhood compiled by Debra Maffett

together. Fathers do like to be counted in. Any girl who will speak
disrespectfully either to or of her father, is lacking in one of the first
principles of real womanhood. She should always remember that Father
has the right . . .
to direct her life,
to say what she shall and shall not do,
to forbid her to go anywhere that is not proper.
His word to her should be final. His approval to her should mean much.
The daughter and her mother come into closer relationship. They touch
each other on many more points, than do daughter and her father. And if
the daughter is safe from the temptations and allurements of sin around
her, she is a girl who makes her mother her chief confidante. To her goes
every secret, every hope, and every fear. All the perplexities of her young
life, are threshed out by Mother's side.
But Mother has so much of her daughter's life to oversee, that it
becomes irksome to the girl. When the girl is small, her mother is
responsible for almost every act every hour of the day. She says how the
child's hair shall be combed, what dress she shall wear, where she shall go,
and what she shall do. This oversight does not end all at once, for the
mother dare not let loose of the responsibility, until the girl is able to take
hold of it. And as the changing over from complete supervision to selfdirection
— is often a hard time for both mother and daughter, the early
teens usually being the hardest struggle.
Let us think of a long bridge reaching across the years, one end of it resting
on those approaching years from ten to twelve — and the other end resting
in the early twenties. When a girl begins to travel this bridge, her parents
have her complete oversight and are wholly responsible for her. By the time
she reaches the other end their, their responsibility ends, and she is on her
own. Somewhere along that bridge, the reins of her life slip out of her
parents' hands, and into her own.
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