Tonight Dart, Homer and Dick Robinson went to the West side to see a very slick train layout. Of course, the owner of said layout runs a hobby shop and has the whole basement of his store for the setup.
Today, he received a little booklet of cute and witty poetry from the Skyline editor, Dick Heynan.
Dart tells Dot that his regular weekly paycheck will be $11.10, including the $1.25 that’s included for a rail pass. The next check, however, will be a little larger because of the extra hours he’s worked.
At this point, he begins to respond directly to Dot’s recent letters – usually just a one-sentence comment on each: It was nice of her to put in all that work on Doug’s gift. It must have made her feel good. His folks are being very secretive about a letter they got from Dot recently; he anticipates something big from that, and he hopes he’s not disappointed. He hopes Doug liked his radio. He was sorry to hear she had trouble at work on Christmas day and he’s anxious to hear about it. His mother was really taken with the pictures of the Pecsok kids, especially Billy. It was very sweet of Gale to give her mica to Santa Claus.
Then he writes that he is already thinking of next Christmas. Janie wrote to tell him that she hopes to spend the holiday with the newlyweds next year. Dart is worried that Dot will be very homesick for her big family and hometown Christmas next year. If she has a new job, she may have to stay in Cleveland, but he’s hoping that they will be able to get back to Greenwich then.
“I like this trading of back-washes idea. What will Mom and Pop think (or say) when we start trading the real thing? We can always tell ’em we’re married!”
He suggests that when they’re living together, they could keep a memo pad for notes about chores and things. He has a similar system that works fairly well for him – as long as he remembers to read his notes!
He has nothing to add about the date of the wedding. June 14 would not be good for Burke. The 19th might be better. He still hasn’t talked with Tom or Hal to ask them if they can be in the wedding, so he doesn’t know any more than he did before.