January 10, 1945

A newsy note from Dot informs the “old salt” that she’s babysitting for Carter Ford again tonight. She enclosed a small photo of the adorable red-haired, dimpled child. Apparently someone gave his mother lots of match books (remember those?) with his photo on the cover, so she’s sending one along.

Dot expressed frustration with how slow the town gets after the holiday hustle – especially Franklin Simons. Today she took a nap in the stock room, wrote two letters and tried on dresses. The latter activity is necessary because she needs a new dress to wear to the alumnae banquet in Willoughby next month. She needs something dressy, but she thinks anything that is not strictly tailored looks bad on her. She chalks that up to her lack of sophistication, making fancy clothes unsuitable for her. She draws a sketch of the dress she chose, based on the number of votes by her co-workers. It’s aqua with short sleeves and a jewel neckline, with a kind of cascading panel in the front. It actually looks pretty and rather sophisticated. I think she struck the right balance.

She suspects that Dart won’t be much interested in her graduation wardrobe, but says it’s difficult to find things to fill the pages when she’s not getting anything from him. Still, it’s a task she’s happy to do.

As humans have been doing for eons when there’s no other conversational subject, she turns to the weather. Today’s temperature in Greenwich reached a frigid nine degrees. She says she’s so sorry she’ll have to miss the lovely spring weather that’s bound to come someday because she’ll still be frozen solid until August.

Sending all her love for all eternity, she signs off.

There are no letters from either tomorrow, but we finally hear from Dart on the 12th. Remember that Dot was not so fortunate in 1945. The last letter she received from him was the one he wrote on December 26, and it’s still quite some time before she hears from him again.

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