On his way home from dropping Dot off in Kent last night, Dart stopped at the local gas station to get some oil for the car. There was so little oil left that, on the advice of the nice old gent who ran the place, Dart drained the old stuff out and then flushed out the grimy, gritty sludge that remained. The whole process took about half an hour, and seems to have been worth it. The car runs much more smoothly and the oil he put in last night is still clean.
Last week’s letter from Burke was quite bitter because he’d been transferred off his homeward bound ARD and assigned shore duty in Guam. Yesterday’s letter was more cheerful because Burke is working in an air conditioned optical shop doing delicate repair work. He likes it far better than the carpentry he was doing on the ARD.
Dart had a long talk with his beloved Miss Palmer – his English teach from Shaw High School. She has invited Dot and Dart to dinner on March 17, if Dot will be in Cleveland on that Sunday. Dart accepted on Dot’s behalf and hopes she doesn’t mind.
He also spoke with his old friend John Angel who returned home from the Army last night. He and his wife Sally are staying with his folks for a while. When he learned that Dot and Dart were engaged, he commented that the only thing better than being engaged is being married, giving Dart a little thrill of anticipation for that big event.
The news from Fred is that he’s in Great Lakes hospital with a mysterious growth on his jaw bone. He’s likely to be there quite some time. What a coincidence that in this massive medical facility, he’s in the same ward where Dart spent so many months early in his Navy career.
Dart’s mother and her brother Tom will go to Ashtabula tomorrow to fetch Flora and bring her to Cleveland. She’ll be staying with Dart’s three aunts on Elsinor St. because they have a room that can be heated to the 90 degrees required by Flora. Everyone thinks she’ll do much better where she can be looked after by so may willing folks.
Dart has been pondering a comment his father made recently about the extreme cost of starting out in marriage. It’s much higher than either he or Dot had anticipated and he’s quite concerned about how they’ll manage. He still wants to get married as soon as possible, but he has no idea where they’ll find the money for an apartment and all the furnishings required. The possibility of moving to Chicago while he attends the University of Chicago is fraught with difficulties. Will he be accepted for summer, or fall, or not at all? Can they afford Chicago rents? Will Dot be able to find a job in a city where she has no contacts? The school is terribly overcrowded now, but they are setting up temporary housing, so there may be some next summer for married students.
“The big thing, though, remains. It is the initial expense. I cannot meet it now. I see no way I can meet it by the time we plan to be married. Above all else, though, is our desire to get married. I hope with all my heart that we will find ways to solve enough of our problems that we will begin our married life under far less handicap than is now apparent. A few, one or two, of these drawbacks could be easily overridden, with care. We have more than a few to face.”
“We have a tendency to see our problems for what they are worth, then to say to ourselves that we can find a solution. That’s alright, as far as it goes, but we go farther. Once we see a problem and say that we can find a solution, we treat that problem as though it were solved, which it is not, and then go on to another one. It’s dangerous. It’s giving us a false sense of security.”
He hopes Dot will not misconstrue his intentions in this letter. He’s only trying to gather their problems, refine his thoughts, and find solutions to as many as he can so that they can confidently move toward a June 1947 wedding date. “The great part of our work lies ahead of us. We’ve done little and must do much before our plans for marriage and the life immediately thereafter, are complete.”
He loves her and wishes he could add something more helpful to this letter. How he hopes she’ll be able to spend her Spring break with him and his parents.
# # #
Dot writes, “You do things to me that sometimes make me think I’m totally nuts. Last night after you left, I came upstairs and set the clock for 7:30 AM. I wound it and put it by my bed, dreading the hour at which it would burst forth and wake me out of a sound sleep. Well, it rang, and strangely enough, I got up. When I went in to call Mid, I glanced at my watch, which said 4:20. Thinking I had forgotten to wind it the night before, I proceeded to wake Mid. She remarked that it felt as though she had just fallen asleep, and glanced at her watch. It too said 4:20. “In less time than it takes to tell, I was back in bed and asleep. But it sure made me angry to think I’ll have to live with this stupidity the rest of my life!”
In other news, the beautiful weather has given Dot a touch of Spring fever. She thinks it would have been a glorious day for Dart to simonize his car, but she doubts he did it. She bowled a lowly 83 in class and can’t figure out what to do about it. She has a theme-writing test in class today, but right now, she’s not sure she could write her name. She reports that she’s “tired and very, very, very much in love.”
“Thanks for being all you are, Dart, and thanks again for taking me to the concert yesterday. I love to go places and do things, but I love it 100% more when you’re with me. Do you think you’ll be down Wednesday?”
I think it’s sweet that Dart visits Dot on campus mid-week. That’s the only way they seem able to survive the separations between weekend visits. These kids are surely making up for the time they lost during the war!