This long letter from Dart has several fine passages. He related that when folks ask whether his name is short for Dartmouth, he has also used the “No, “Yale” retort. “Slays ’em without bloodshed,” he quipped.

There’s a long descriptive section about the terrors of chemistry exams. “You take a peek at the exam…growing bolder, you read a question. Little green things start running up and down your spine. You break out in a tingling, cold sweat. Your pencil wants to write one thing and YOU want it another way, so you compromise on the wrong answer. It happens every time.”

He continues the old discussion about upside down stamps and the meaning of the shorthand symbol Dart attempts at the end of many letters (Remember, if you will, that they both mean “I love you,” but neither of our correspondents has actually admitted that.) “I hope with all my heart that we know what we’re talking about with our stamps and shorthand. It’s a wonderful feeling, too. I like it.”

A little more chat about other letters he’s received – and then he writes “Please keep those swell letters coming, Dot, dear. It means so much to me now.”

He ends with a final retort, “Whenever my brother goes out, Mom says ‘Be good and have fun.’ Burke always answers, ‘Make up your mind!’ I hope you don’t feel that way too!”

Dot writes to Dart from her friend Nancy’s house in Kent. By the way, Dot and Nancy are still in touch after all these years and Nancy still lives in Kent OH.

Dot reports that he was awakened very early yesterday by her friend waving two letters in her face. She noticed right away that Dart had used a different pen to write them with. The she reports that Nancy and a girl from Puerto Rico went to the movies to see “Heaven Can Wait,” which Dot loved, as she seems to love all movies.

She confesses that she had never heard of the Catholic girl Dart spoke of until he mentioned her, but she told him she doesn’t mind at all if he writes to her. She then confesses that, contrary to all her hints about knowing everything about him, she really doesn’t know anything except what he has told her.

She complements Dart on his good guess about her recent code – Chamberlain Sends Own Best Wishes, but clues him in on the real meaning of “Camay- soap of beautiful women.” What’s with all these homages she pays to Madison Avenue advertising slogans?

She talks about a teen club she and her friends visited the night before. It sounds like the kind of place today’s kids would enjoy if they were looking for tame entertainment- an old warehouse they had cleaned up, added ping-pong tables and a soda bar. I wonder where they held their rave parties back then?

True to the woman I would come to know as Mom, Dot goes into great enthusiastic detail about the Army-Navy football game she’s listening to on the radio. She is screaming for Navy and practically runs off the page when her team breaks a 0-0 tie. Little does she know at that point in her life that Dart didn’t know a touchdown from a crochet hook – nor would he ever. Dot was always the “jock” in the family.

She closes with a sweet comment. “We might go see ‘The Sky’s the Limit.’ You must admit I like the ‘higher’ type movie. ‘Heaven Can Wait’ and now this.  Maybe it’s just cuz I’m walking around with my head in the clouds.”