Dart writes two letters today, one started in the wee hours of the morning after he returned from his visit to Kent. “Can’t go to bed without writing to you. It must really be love if I can spend eight hours with you and then come home and write you a letter.”

He tells Dot that he had three companions on his trip home to Cleveland; he picked up two guys in Kent and drove them to the next town, and then picked up a guy in Hudson and dropped him off at the streetcar stop near his own apartment in Cleveland. The company and the warm blanket, generously donated by Ellie, kept him entertained and comfortable on the tedious trip back.

“I hope Ellie understands that we know she was serious when she told us what we already know; how fortunate we are. I know I looked silly, for I still had the spirit of the earlier moments, but I realized that she was being serious, and that what she said was matter for serious thought. Yes, Dot, we are fortunate.”

“I better stop here before I fall asleep. Thank you, Darling, over and over again, for being all that you are and for trying to be much of what I want you to be. I love you always, and forever.”

His next letter is written toward the end of the day. He spent nearly the whole day working on an old interurban car he’s building. He fears he’s botched the roof and will have to make a new one.

His Aunt Flora is in another bad way. Both his parents and his Aunts are preparing to bring her to Cleveland, if she’ll agree to come by ambulance. His mother is preparing to go out to Ashtabula to prepare Flora for the trip into the city, while Dart and his dad prepare a room for Flora in their apartment. The Aunts are also making room for her in their house, so she’ll have a choice of homes. Her stay in Cleveland, should it happen, could be a very long one, and Dart worries about the extra burden it will place on his mother. Everyone is all riled up about the situation right now.

Dart’s Uncle Guy – his father’s wealthy and successful brother, has asked Dart, Sr. to come work for him,  now that his customers have dried up, his business is failing, and Pop is no longer able to work. Dart describes it as quite a soap opera. I’m not sure what the whole situation was, except that Guy was the favorite son of his parents, and with all of his success, rarely had anything to offer his brother except criticism. The relationship between the brothers was always strained.

The whole family is concerned by the news of a giant tidal wave heading toward Guam, where Burke is stationed. Dart has learned from Fred that tropical storms and tidal waves are fearsome business on that small island. They all hope Burke has found adequate shelter. Dart also wonders about the fate of the John R Craig while the Pacific is wildly churning with severe weather.

In answer to Dot’s letter written from the infirmary, he expresses disapproval of that photo of Ellie.  “That Ellie girl must surely be proud of something, if she wants her picture taken with things (like legs) showing like those were. Be it cute or not, I don’t think much of the idea. They aren’t so beautiful anyway.” When I read passages like this, I hardly recognize the writer as the man I knew as a father. Here, he sounds like an old fuddy-duddy. The man I grew up with, while rather conservative in his own behavior, was not such a stick-in-the-mud about other people. With age came a more relaxed attitude – a willingness to let people be themselves, without judgement.

He hasn’t discussed Kent as an education option with his folks, but if he could get in there, he’d be willing to make a start. He feels strongly that he wants to at least begin the completion of his degree before he and Dot set THE DATE.  He doesn’t want to do anything that would delay the planning for their wedding day. Says Dart, “Oh, how I love the sound of those two words!”

“Goodnight, Dot. You were thinking of the same secret I was, and of course I knew you wouldn’t tell the girls. That kind of stuff is just too intimate, too lovely, too much our own to talk about with anyone else. Too bad about that big, lonesome bed of yours. Mine’s small, but just as lonesome.”

#          #          #

Today, Dot, Ellie and Mid walked into town to see a show; “The Harvey Girls,” starring Judy Garland. It was a lively musical and the three friends had a good time together.

Dot writes that when she was Ellie’s roommate, she noticed that all the girls congregated in their room for gossip and chats. She thought that by moving into a room of her own, she’d have more time to herself, but this evening, once again, the girls of the house gathered around her bed. She can’t even recalled what they talked about, but during the two-hour gab fest, she accomplished nothing but setting her hair.

There’s another dance on campus this weekend if Dart would like to come out for it. If he decides that would be fun, she again asks that he bring a date or two for the girls in the house. Dot made the grave error of telling the girls that most of Dart’s friends were taller than he, and Janie has made a point of reminding Dot every 5 minutes that she’s tall, too, and wouldn’t object to a date with one of Dart’s tall friends. “But really, Dear, you don’t need to supply the whole house. In fact, just one man is enough to satisfy me, if that one is you.”

She had loads of fun in swimming class today. The class was split into two groups – excellent swimmers and non-, or poor swimmers. Of course, Dot was in the former group and was asked several times to demonstrate various strokes as the instructor described it from the pool’s edge. She paired up with a non-swimmer and helped her learn the basics. She was pleased to have been singled out in such a positive way after the “beating” she took in biology. Later, Dot and Mid went back to the pool for open swim and had loads of fun.

Now she’s not sure if her eyes are burning from all the chlorine, or from lack of sleep, but either way, she’s ending this letter to get a little shut-eye. She wishes him well on Wednesday night, and then adds a PS saying that a letter from her mother today “brought the sad news that the deal in June is practically impossible.” I’m not sure what that means, but she may be referring to her hope that the Petersons could drive her back to Greenwich and then vacation with the Chamberlains at Sunapee.

Dart’s letter hints at the frugality these two kids are practicing these days. Apparently, when Dart left Kent on Sunday evening, Dot gave him a letter she’d written to him, and asked him to mail it for her on his way back to Cleveland. That way, he’d have a letter to open on Tuesday. Instead of mailing the letter, he held on to the sealed envelope until today, then carefully opened it. He has enclosed the envelope in his letter to her so that she can use it, and the stamp, again.

He hasn’t shaved since Sunday morning. He loafed around the house all day. He looks like a “fugitive from some warm place.”

He assumes he and his father will go out job-hunting tomorrow after his mother leaves for Ashtabula to tend to Aunt Flora. He says “The sun has been so hot lately that we may go down to the county courthouse. We’ve heard they have some shady deals down there.”

The old mid-week loneliness has struck me and I can’t think of much to write, so I’ll shove in all the love I can manage to impart in a letter, and send letter, envelope and love right along to you. Goodnight, Dot Darling. I love you.”

#          #          #

Dot was surprised to get a letter Dart had written on Sunday night, just hours after he had left Kent.  “It really wasn’t necessary for you to write to me Sunday night, but I love you all the more cuz’ you did. Guess that’s why I love you so much all the time; you always do just a little bit more than is expected.It’s a trait I admire very much.”

Nobody in her house has much interest in the dance Friday night, so he surely doesn’t have to come unless he wants to. She hopes he’ll remember Janie and Phyll if and when he manages to drum up an extra man.

She begins work at the Robin Hood restaurant on Sunday, serving private parties and banquets. On the day she was offered that job, she was also offered the daily 7 to 11 shift at the local diner, but she turned that down. With such a full academic schedule, she thought that job would wear her out. Besides, she likes the upscale atmosphere of the Robin Hood much better.

How she wishes she could learn to write a decent letter. She feels hers, never great to  begin with, have gone downhill since Dart’s return from the war. Even her mother has commented. Gee, could it be that she’s buried in school work and also wants to spend time with Dart and her friends? I wish she’d give herself a little slack. For now, she’s too tired to find a solution to that problem, however. Tomorrow she has 6 classes! “I don’t know where the time goes, but it sure gets there fast!”

Dart writes a newsy four-pager, telling Dot of his day. He enclosed some snapshots they took when she was staying at the Peterson home. There was a good one of the two of them so he ordered five copies; one for her parents, one for Burke, and three to give as booby prizes at their future bridge party.

He and Pop went downtown today to pick up Dart’s certified discharge papers, have lunch, and watch a Telenews show. Helen is in Ashtabula, so there may be some work to do around the apartment if Dot hopes to visit this weekend.

He and his dad have been trying to learn more about the typhoon that struck Guam a few days ago, but they haven’t learned much. They listened to the radio until the stations went off the air, but no news came. As they sat reading, the house began to creak and rattle to the point of distraction. Pop found a radio station still on the air, so they listened to Rachmaninoff’s Isle of the Dead. “That piece is slow, stately, soft, and melancholy beyond description. What better way to spend a quiet evening at home, unless I’d been reading a ghost story or, say Lady of the Morgue, which I had. I’d not have been surprised at all to hear sighs, groans, clanking chains and falling objects, not to see a cobwebby skeleton fall from behind the hanging coats in the dining room corner. Creep? My flesh crawled so fast I had to run to keep up with it!”

Dart began his first night as the adviser to a group of Jr. Hi-Y boys. “The boys are wide-awake, of high average spirit and intelligence, and they are leaders in the school, scholastically and athletically. They seem to be a likable bunch of boys and they are honored to be the only club with an advisor. I hope I can be of help to them, and they of help to me.” And I hope we hear more about this new activity in Dart’s life. I wonder if he’s doing this as resume’ builder, to let a future employer know he didn’t just sit idle after the war.

He writes a paragraph about how surprised he was to see his own face after he shaved today. (Perhaps being a Jr. Hi-Y advisor is already having an impact on him.) He also tells Dot that the only work he did on his model streetcar today was to go to the Sohio station to buy the paint. When Dart explained he was looking for wine red touch-up paint, the clerk mixed up a batch of claret-maroon – a color used on 1939 Fords and Mercurys.  Dart told the man he had a “1903 Kuhlman” he wanted to paint, but the clerk didn’t ask him about it.

He regrets that she was not at home when he called her tonight because he would have loved to hear her voice before going to sleep. “Gee, here’s the end of the letter and I haven’t answered your 3-pager, or even said how much I love you. But how can I describe it in terms more devastating than a seismic wave or a typhoon? It is as boundless as that.”

#          #          #

Dot was disgusted that she sits home six nights out of seven, but on the night she leaves, Dart calls. As much as she would have loved to hear his voice, she and her friends had a ball. Four of the housemates took a bus into Akron and saw “Road to Utopia,” which Dot thoroughly enjoyed. She hopes Dart and Homer have a chance to see it.

She mentions calling Bonnie and found she was playing checkers with Bill. They both thank Dart for mailing that photo of them. They’ve decided they won’t be getting married for a long, long time. Well, that brings us up to date on Bonnie and Bill, except for one thing: Who the heck are Bonnie and Bill? I don’t recall either Dot or Dart mentioning them before. I only remember a Janie and Bill.

She was sorry to read about all of the Peterson family bad news. It seems like they’ve had their share lately. Does Dart think his father will be returning to work? Is there any news of Aunt Flora, or of whether Burke was safe in Guam? With everything on his mother’s plate, Dot would be happy to take Dart off her hands for a while!

“Today was Gordon’s and Betty’s third wedding anniversary. It doesn’t seem possible they’ve been married that long. How time does fly, I hope.”

She assures Dart of her ever-lasting love and then turns toward bed.

Amazingly, Dart’s cold is still hanging on! He has lots of letters to write, and he’d planned to attend a get-together at church for returning service men tonight, but he felt so miserable after supper that he just crashed on the davenport. His father spent the time dozing in the big chair. Aren’t they a couple of firebrands while the lady of the house is away?

His mother will be in Ashtabula for at least the remainder of the week. It seems as though Flora has decided against coming into Cleveland where she could be under the care of numerous siblings. Dart seems most concerned about where his meals will be coming from in her absence, but he and his dad have some of their meals covered already. They’ll go to the Burke home for Sunday dinner, (That’s the three unmarried aunts and a bachelor uncle who live together on Cleveland’s east side. ) Dart, Sr. is a pretty fair cook of simple meals, and Helen left a big pot of stew for her boys to eat while she was away.  With a deli in the neighborhood and plenty of milk to drink, Dart is confident he won’t actually starve.

Homer stopped by today. The guys shot the breeze, discussing the Army and the Navy, model railroading and other trifles. Still, Dart didn’t answer any of his stack of letters.

He and his father have a “date” with The Harvey Girls tomorrow, and he hopes to see Road to Utopia with Homer or Al later in the week. Dart seems to be keeping busy for the sake of keeping busy. That’s a common tactic, I think, when folks are trying to ward off mild depression, or when they want to avoid unpleasant tasks like job-hunting or applying to colleges.

He enjoyed a cute little card that Dot sent this week. He appreciates that she does those unexpected things for him, and that she is so very appreciative of little things he does for her. Her reaction makes him want to do more nice things. He notes that people who don’t appreciate the niceties probably don’t get many little “extras” in life. Being around Dot just makes him want to be good and do good. He guesses she’s a positive influence on him.

Speaking of niceties, he fears he was a little curt with Dot’s landlord Holly the other night. Dart was miffed that Holly interrupted Dot and Dart’s “final clinch” of the evening with chatter about a long-ago road trip he’d taken.  Now he vows to ask Holly about the trip and the photos he has from back then the next time he’s in Kent. A summer-long western road trip such as the one Holly described, taken decades before, must surely have been an arduous adventure and Dart intends to show the proper respect for that when he sees Holly next.

“Gee,” he says sarcastically, “I wonder who the calling card is that brings the cackle session into you room, no matter where that room is.”

In her recent letter, Dot had told Dart a story of what happened when Mid came to wake her up for classes one morning. Dot had allegedly responded “Oh, Dart, can’t we just sleep a little longer?” Mid had teased her mercilessly. Dart suggests that, while he likes the idea of sleeping late with her, she might want to avoid using his name at times like that, lest it lead to harmful gossip and the wrong idea.

He rambles on for a bit about how people who can swim bother him. They bother him because he feels inferior. He feels inferior because 1) he can’t seem to learn to swim, and 2) he has a mortal fear of being in water that’s over his head. He’ll try to work on all of that, since he’s in love with a girl who’d rather swim than walk.

He too fears that the big trip these two had dreamed about this June is out of the question. There’s almost no chance that his folks will be able to drive her back to Greenwich and then continue on to Sunapee. He doesn’t say it, but I think the Peterson family is facing heavy financial difficulties, rendering a cross-country trip out of reach. Related to that is the uncertain employment of both Dart and his father. He’ll continue to work on his folks, but things look bad from here.

Offering another lament about his neglected correspondence, he decides it’s time to get to bed. But not, thank goodness, before reflecting a moment on his love for Dot. “I love you and miss you all the time. I dream that you’re here every minute of the day, and almost every act I perform reminds me of a fleeting moment with you. Goodnight, Darling. I wish we could be whispering those words into each other’s ear, then not even moving before going to sleep. I’m always thankful for such a lovely, affectionate, responsive, thoughtful girl as you for a fiance’. I’m thankful, too for the times and ways we’ve found to express our love for each other.”

#           #          #

It was a thrill to hear Dart’s voice tonight when he called, but she would love to also see the face the voice belongs to. She doesn’t know, if she misses him this much after not seeing him for two weeks, how she managed to survive his months overseas. She adds that she didn’t love him as much then as she does now, so maybe that’s it.

Janie had a date with a pre-war boyfriend tonight. Even though he brought a bag of burgers for the girls in the house and gave Janie a lovely birthday gift, she still says they’re “just friends.” It must be hard for her to be excited by anyone after having recently broken up with a fiance she seemed crazy about.

She tells a tale on herself – about how she made a fool of herself at the pool today. She saw Jester-a guy she and Dart met recently, standing by the edge of the pool, and challenged him to a race to the other end. He reach the far end three yards ahead of her, and only then revealed the he’d been the high school speed swimmer before the war! Now she’ll only challenge the poor swimmers to a race because her ego can’t take such a sound defeat.

She reiterates that it would be swell if Al, or Homer, or both could come out to Kent when Dart comes for the play next weekend. She’ll try to get six tickets in the hope that Phyl and Janie will have dates with Dart’s friends.

With a biology test tomorrow, she must now focus on studying. She thanks him again for giving her spirits a lift with that phone call, and she cautions him not to make his mother work too hard when she gets home from her nursing duties with Flora.

She signs her letter “All my love, forever and a day.”

Dart zips off a quick one-page letter before heading to bed at 1:30 AM. He and his buddy Al went to see Gary Cooper and Ingrid Bergman in Saratoga Trunk tonight. Dart liked it very much, especially the performance of a “cute and clever dwarf.”

Maybe Dot’s episode with Jester the speed swimmer the other day will teach her to pick on someone her own size. Still, he’s impressed that she only lost by three yards to a champion swimmer.

When Dart spoke with Al tonight about Phyl, Al admitted he had a preference for tall blondes, so it looks like Al and Phyl have dates for next Friday night. Dart wants to go on record as saying that the only girl he’s interested in seeing next Friday is Dot. “Just you. Only you. You, always.”

He has to hit the sack so he can get up in time for church tomorrow.

#          #          #

As is often the case, Dot’s letter opens with the same thoughts as Dart’s. It’s after midnight, and she can’t write much because she wants to get up in time for church.

She’s delighted that their penny jar has grown to $32.11. She’s only saved $1.15 since she came back from spring break, and she wonders what Dart has been doing to add to it so fast.

The pictures he sent are swell. She still has to look at them for a long time to get over the fact that it’s really him in civilian clothes. How she loves looking at them, though.

She’s happy to hear that his first night as Jr Hi-Y advisor went so well. Those boys are obviously top-ranked, scholastically if they have the smarts to recognize how lucky they are to have him as an advisor! She knows both the boys and he will benefit from this arrangement, and she wishes him luck, altho’ he needs none from her.

Last night, she and Joyce, and Phyl decided to go to the movies, seeing a double feature of Doll Face and The Red Dragon. The movies were passable, mainly because the girls’ only alternative was to stay home and do some work. I think I can get a little idea of why her penny jar deposits aren’t growing as quickly as they might!

She got a rather hot letter from her mother today in response to one she’d written last week. In that earlier letter, Dot had expressed, perhaps too strongly, that she thought her parents’ excuses for not coming to Ohio to get her at the end of the school year were rather weak. Now Dart writes that he’s sure his folks will not agree to drive her back to Greenwich. Now it looks as though Dot’s hopes of getting the two families to get to know each other are more or less dashed. She’s pretty steamed about it, but what can she do?

Her mother also wrote that Gordon gave Betty a Philco radio-vic for their anniversary. It’s some kind of radio/record player where you slide the record into a slot to play it. Dot thinks they’ll regret not getting an automatic record changer instead. I tend to agree, because the technology she speaks of was still around 30 years later, but who even remembers the slot-style record player?

She sends Dart a big goodnight kiss and tells him she loves him in all the ways it’s possible to love.

Just before beginning this letter, Dart called his sweetheart because he couldn’t let the weekend pass without hearing her voice. She knows most of the news, but he’ll fill her in on the rest.

After church this morning, he and Pop went to the Burke home fo

r dinner. They got there just as Helen was returning from Ashtabula. As they were all eating and hearing Helen’s news of Flora, Flora’s husband Art called to ask if Helen and someone else could return to Ashtabula as soon as possible – today!

While Helen cooked a hasty dinner for the Darts, young Dart greased and gassed the car. He and Pop drove Helen and Aunt Jo back to Ashtabula – a round trip that took only four and a half hours. They were unable to visit with Flora while there because she was asleep.

As he writes this letter, he’s gazing at the snapshot his mother took of him and Dot in the backyard over spring break. He thinks it’s one of the best pictures of the two of them ever taken. They’re not grinning like Cheshire cats, but they look happy and very much in love. As he gazes, he’s trying to mentally dress the couple in wedding garb, and he likes the results very much. (He assures her that he did not attempt to undress them prior to putting on the wedding attire.)

How he yearns for those wedding photos to become a reality. He sends her all his love.

#          #          #

If Dart weren’t such a doggone swell guy, and if he hadn’t done such a swell thing as calling her this evening, she would surely have gone to bed without writing tonight. It’s after midnight and she must be up by 7:30, but she must send him her love and gratitude for his thoughtfulness.

Ellie is back and telling everyone of her new love. (I really need a score card to keep track of all the women in this house and their various romances.) Dot thinks this one might be a good guy because after three dates, he hasn’t tried to kiss Ellie yet.  (In today’s world, the poor chap would be written off by now as either too shy, or probably gay. How times have changed.)

Dot cleaned her room thoroughly, did a small mountain of ironing, and worked at Robin Hood. No wonder she’s beat! Before signing off, she urges Dart to take her up on the “swimming deal,” which I trust we’ll learn more about in future letters.

Dot must have invited Dart to a weenie roast because the first part of his letter is a report on his efforts to secure a date for one of her friends. Homer is a no-go and Al is a probably not. He’ll keep trying.

He’s enclosing copies of the snapshot they both liked, but the copies have been poorly developed and aren’t as good as the originals.

He must have been half asleep when he counted their penny jar because he was off by about $10. Sadly, their total is actually only about $22. I hope they can get to $100 by the time they marry.

Warner and Swasey offered him no hope of a job with them. They have 200 of their former workers who are back from the war that they must find space for. Also a letter from the VA says he’s earned 43 months and 24 days of college tuition, if he can get into a school. Now he sits with no school, no job, and very little hope of marrying a year from June. He feels strongly that they must be established in at least one part of their lives before they take the big leap, but all he can think about is taking that big leap.

Last night he had a dream about Dot, followed by a nightmare that included her also. “How you and your family got to be living in the Windemere Methodist Church parsonage, he can’t say, but that’s where they were. The atomic bomb had just destroyed all of Cleveland except a handful of people. He awoke, sick with fear that they were all dying from “radiations,” but then he went back to sleep and dreamed that they were alright. At some point he and Dot were separated because he remembers a joyful reunion as they found each other again.

“Since I heard a radio program last week, and now since that nightmare last night, I’ve picked up the ill-at-ease, fearful, almost guilty feeling I had when the A-bomb was first announced. For my own sense of peace and that of the rest of the world, I wish that terrible weapon had never been possible to invent.”

When he sleeps tonight, he hopes he dreams of another reunion. Better yet, he wishes they could have one like it in real life, and never have to be parted again.

“Thanks for the big kiss goodnight you sent me. Here’s another one like it, with one of our favorite embraces thrown in for no extra cost.”

#          #          #

Another hurried letter from Dot brings him up to date on some of the details she didn’t have time to explain on the phone about the weenie roast. (I find it endearing that she was nervous about “calling a boy,” even though that boy was her fiance!) Anyway, Phyl tried to set up a date to the weenie roast for Janie, but he said he’d only do it if he could bring a friend and if Phyll would be his friend’s date. She agreed, and then asked Mid if she would be the date for the guy that Dart was hoping to bring.I found my self fretting a bit about the fact that Mid may be stuck without a date, when I remembered that these events happened 70 years ago and any hard feelings on Mid’s part have surely been long forgotten.

Although she’s excited about all these last minutes plans and a chance to see Dart earlier than expected, she hopes she finds some time to get a little studying in before the Wednesday night weenie roast.

Holly has no hard feelings about Dart’s curt response the other night. He confessed that he intentionally interrupted Dot and Dart’s farewell to create a little stir. He still thinks Dart is one of the finest young men he’s ever met, and Dot wholeheartedly agrees.

Dart shouldn’t stew about not being an expert swimmer. In swim class today, Dot was surprised to learn she’s not very good at floating on her back. Forget that old myth about “bigger” girls being good floaters. Her instructor resembles a toothpick and she floats just fine!

She must get to bed, but not without telling Dart how much she loves him and how eager she is to see him tomorrow night. Of course, that means there are no letters written on April 9, but our steadfast writers will return on the 10th.

The first part of Dart’s letter describes why he didn’t get home from Kent until 3:30 AM. He stopped at a Sohio gas station on his way out of town to have the oil checked. It was okay, but there were other troubles with the car. When it was up on the hoist, the old mechanic wanted to replace the missing “Alimite” fitting (whatever that is), but decided the whole car had been built around that fitting, and they’d have to disassemble the whole car to get to it. He also noticed a huge blister on a rear tire with the inner tube pushing through. That’s a very dangerous situation, so he changed that tire for a not-much-better spare. While he was there, he flushed out the engine again, explaining that it should be done every 1,000 miles and the car had gone 1,017 since its last flush.

All of this talk about the car brought up several thoughts. First, how lucky Dart was to find a gas station that was open so late at night, staffed by such a helpful and knowledgeable mechanic. Second, how much work and maintenance those old cars needed! I recall when I was a child, Dad kept a little notebook in the glove compartment of every car we owned. In it, he would faithfully record every gallon of gas pumped into the car, the dates of oil changes, and a journal entry for any and all other work done on the vehicle. He’d check that info regularly and discuss it with the service man at our local station. He often carried spare parts on long road trips, “just in case.”  Even with all that TLC, I still remember more than one cross-country trip that was punctuated by hours spent in a service station somewhere, or a period of time by the side of the road, waiting for assistance. Compare that to the ease of today’s cars, and it makes me a big fan of progress!

Turning his attentions to the weenie roast he writes, “Gee, Dot, that was a swell time we had last night. One of the best ever. One more thing I like about us is that we can have fun together at things like that. Often, I’ve been out when my date and I were out laughing, having fun at the same time, but it seemed like at different things. But you and I seemed to be having our fun together. Next time, though, I’ll wear a baseball cap or something more befitting the occasion. Although you don’t look any better than most women in slacks, you don’t look any worse, either. Therefore, because you’re you and because I love you so very much, I’ll be willing to accept you in slacks, as much as in anything else.” (That last part has rendered me almost speechless!)

He goes on to say that he thinks they didn’t do too badly at the dancing. He suspects she does better with another partner, but once they get their signals straight, he thinks the two of them will do fine on the dance floor.

Then he gets a little weird again, reveling his prudish, big-brotherly side. “Oh, say – are you sure you’re acquainted with the double meaning (I think there’s only one) of the Chicago Department Store song? If you are, you’ll not sing it too often, and if you aren’t – be careful. It ain’t so nice. Implies bawdy living and all stuff like what Erla probably does.” (Boy, am I glad Dad had lost some of his fuddy-duddiness by the time we kids came along! And I suspect Dot was fully aware of the meaning of the song.)

He explains the minor “tragedy of miscommunication” that he and Homer experienced. Dart thought he already had a date for Wednesday night, and Homer thought Dart was asking him to find a date for then. Consequently, Homer didn’t go to the weenie roast at Kent, and one of Dot’s housemates must have been dateless. When Dart and Homer figured out their mistake the following day, Homer actually said “dammit” right in front of Dart’s father!

Speaking of his father, Dart mentions that the two of them have been washing the kitchen walls and ceiling. Although the place looks much better, he’s pretty sure they’ll end up painting the place anyway.

He seems to have another successful night at the Y. The evening of the Jr. Hi-Y swim meet happened to coincide with the final night of the YMCA membership drive. His “boss,” Mr. Cumler had to stay at the YMCA House in order to oversee the new member registrations, so he turned the oversight of the swim meet to Dart. His boys won the swimming and came in second in the diving portion, thereby winning the meet. “It was lots of fun and something I didn’t expect when I took over the job of assisting in leading the boys. Mr. Cumler says I was of real service tonight, which was what I wanted.”

He finally answers Dot’s letter of January 30, which she wrote in response to his description of his night in the Panama gin joint. If you’ll recall, that letter went all the way out to the John R Craig at sea, only to turn around and finds its way back to Cleveland after Dart was discharged. He hopes he’ll have the chance again soon to write one of those descriptive letters she likes so much.

He hopes her biology test this morning went well, but that might be hard after the fun evening they had yesterday. He asks what the heck is up with Ellie. It seems she has new “one and only” every week. He also wonders about all the other girls in the house who are engaged. He thought that he and Dot were the only people at the party who behaved like an engaged couple. He’ll be back in Kent on Friday, and he wishes she would be riding back with him. It’s been nearly three weeks since she’s been to his house and he misses her!

He closes with “Goodnight, Dot. I love you beyond all description. I miss the feel of you in my arms, the softness of your lips, your radiance when we are together, our whispered ‘I love you’s’ and all the rest of the ways we have of expressing our love and devotion for each other.”

#          #          #

Dot writes that she has secured tickets for the play Snafu this weekend. She’s disappointed with the location of their seats, but since they were free for students, she guesses it’s okay that they are way up in the back of the balcony, and way over to the side.

Tonight, she and Mid decided to take a walk downtown. As they approached the movie theater, they noticed it was playing a double feature of Cover Girl and Confidential Agent. They looked at each other, nodded in silent agreement, and entered the theater at 6:00. The came out at 10:00, having been thoroughly entertained.

Dot mentions for the first time that she is fairly certain she won’t be returning to Kent next fall. Part of her wishes she could, but there’s something she wants much, much more, and she thinks she’d better start working toward that goal. (Gee, I wonder what she might be talking about!) She hasn’t mentioned the subject of leaving school to her folks yet, but she intends to write to them as soon as she’s done with this letter.

Tonight nearly every girl in the house pledged into a sorority. She and Janie feel a bit like outcasts, but they stand firm in their convictions. The other girls in the house have come to believe they’ll never get anywhere in life unless they join a sorority, but if Dot becomes a success at something, she wants it to be on her own merits, rather than the fact that an employer was affiliated with a particular Greek organization. Her mother, Harriet, and El were all in sororities, and she knows her mother would scrimp in order to pay for Dot’s expenses, if she were asked, but Dot feels her parents are already sacrificing enough to send her to school. “But I’m satisfied being an “Independent,” and if you don’t mind not dating a sorority girl, I’d rather remain one.”

She’s so grateful he made that long trip to campus tonight. “That’s the most fun I’ve ever had at a weenie roast. Afterward, all the girls came into my room to remind me that you’re one in a million and I’d better never forget it. (As if I could.)” She also told Dart that everyone admired him for not drinking or smoking.

“I miss you terribly, Dart. I didn’t want to see you leave last night. Of course, I never want to see you leave, but it was stronger than ever last night.”