Life Among the Savages by Shirley Jackson Page A

would tiptoe thoughtfully away from the dining room door. Perhaps if we had demitasse cups a local couple, who have no children and have exhibited a vast distaste for our hospitality, would come to call. Perhaps, as a matter of fact, if we had demitasse cups, we could overlook the fact that the vast distaste of the local couple was provoked by our short-tempered reception of their resentment of our children. We should live more graciously, after all.
    Then, naturally, there is the question of the cups themselves. I am immediately tempted to buy them just as cheaply as possible (there’s a list for you, the prices of things) and have thought of the five and ten (“. . . and I got the sweetest little cups right there, can you imagine, and even though the cups and saucers came separately I didn’t really pay much more . . .”) but dismissed the idea through pride (“. . . and everyone could tell because of course those same patterns . . .”). I shall have to go off and purchase them in some big store where I have a charge account (“. . . a charge account? Let me just tell you what happened to me when . . .”) and I suspect that I will end up after a day of shopping with four cheap flowered demitasse cups and a set of dishes (I have so been needing dishes) and a set of glassware which will be wonderful for the children to use when they have company for breakfast, and while I am in that department I think I ought to look at electric mixers because it is only four months to my birthday.
    I tabulated recently a conversation, or double-listing, between two women, one of them me. The conversation began, civilly enough, with a compliment from me about my friend’s new slipcover, which she had made herself. We then went rapidly through slipcovers (custom-made, prices of) the value of a sewing machine, the clothes children wore to school, and children’s shoes (prices of). She then remarked that she hated to repeat cute things her children had said, but she just had to tell me what her daughter said the other day. I retaliated with a really clever story about Jannie. She said that prices were awful, weren’t they; the conversation could have ended right there, with both of us crying, but fortunately one of our husbands stepped in with a remark about how we had really planned to play bridge, hadn’t we? because if we had, here were the cards dealt and the chairs ready. We sat down, and she told me about how angry her husband had been the last time we played bridge, because she had reneged twice, and I told her a little sad story about how my husband had opened once with two hearts and I had said two spades and he said three diamonds and there I sat with the king, jack, seven of diamonds and . . . well, she told me about these people they used to know, and I told her about these people we used to know, and then she said, well, the way some people bring up their children, and I told her about the bad manners of the children of these friends of ours, and she said well, of course, progressive education, and my husband said were we going to play bridge or weren’t we? So then she said that she loved my new blouse and I said I wished I could make things for myself, and she said the stores were awful, weren’t they. I told her about how a salesclerk was so rude I walked out without buying anything, and she said that the butcher in our mutual grocery was really terribly mean today about the hamburger. I said that even hamburger was almost out of our range these days and she told me about how prices are up at least two cents a pound since practically yesterday. I told her that I understood that the main reason they had given up school lunches was the cost, and she said that it really cost less to make lunch at home and send it, the way things were these days. I said the only trouble was, Laurie preferred sandwiches made with cold meat, and she said had I tried this new spread made with