Ask Angel

Hi. When I read your article in the paper, I was very happy. Because I have a big problem. It is my sister. She is 16 and I am 11. But she always hogs the bathroom. What should I do?

--Jane

Dear Jane,

Your sister has rights. She is older than you and she has to look pretty for her boy friends. When you get to be her age you will understand. So I suggest that you just leave her alone.

--Angel

So runs the pragmatic advice of the nation's newest and youngest sob sister. She is Angel Maria Cavaliere, age ten, a carpenter's daughter in Philadelphia who three times a week gives sage counsel to the prepuberty set in the pages of the Philadelphia Bulletin. In only three weeks, "Dear Angel" has drawn more than 1,000 letters from youngsters seeking wisdom on everything from schoolyard bullying to parental restriction.

The idea was Angel's alone. A self-confessed expert at dispensing advice ("There are 39 in my class, and I must have solved problems for all of them"), Angel wrote the Bulletin asking, "Please may I have a summer job? I know I could help people with their problems because I like people." Paul Murphy, assistant to the managing editor of the normally staid Bulletin, thought it was worth a try, and the "summer job" may turn into year-round employment. The salary of $50 a week is not bad by sub-teen standards, and Bulletin editors are even thinking of syndicating Angel to other papers so the underage lovelorn elsewhere can benefit from her advice.

The Bulletin selects the letters for Angel to answer in order to screen out obscene ones written by what she calls "crankpots." The editors profess a hands-off policy with her copy and insist that it goes out to her followers just as she writes it. Angel ponders three letters for each column, takes an hour to write answers in longhand, then laboriously types them. She works in her bedroom on the second floor of her family's row house, shooing away three younger siblings as deadlines approach and the pressure mounts. Her quick success has made Angel consider giving up her ambition to be a kindergarten teacher in favor of a full-time future career in journalism.

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