Keeping smart without old women (7)
I believe the answer is:
stowing
'keeping' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both acts as well as being singular nouns.
Maybe there's an association between them I don't understand?
'smart without old women' is the wordplay.
'smart' becomes 'sting' (both can mean to burn or hurt).
'without' means one lot of letters goes inside another ('without' can be similar in meaning to 'outside').
'old' becomes 'o' (common abbreviation eg in OE for Old English).
'women' becomes 'w' (standard abbreviation).
'o'+'w'='ow'
'sting' placed around 'ow' is 'STOWING'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Another definition for stowing that I've seen is " Packing or storing away".)