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231 Navy #3247 (Mil. Govt) F.P.O. San Francisco Wed. 23 May 7:30 pm Dearly Beloved, Am just stopping off to get a letter all set up to go for the first time today I get a chance to write- envelope stamped and addressed and letter barely started. Already this morning I've been out to the school farm with Kirby Etter to see what can be plowed and planted next, and by the P.O. to weigh my several envelopes of last night and buy more stamps - when we went by the school (an hour and a half before opening time) there were a hundred or more youngsters at play or sitting in classroom tents already - It is bright and hot, like the past few days. I've been out in the sun a good deal recently - have picked up as much tan in the past two weeks, in fact (or since I went fishing) as in all the time theretofore. But I'm not really black, and can't compare with a lot of the enlisted men. 5 pm Have just come from the Officer's Club, where Arthur and I stopped on our way back from the office for a coke: [pg 2] into the glass of coke and crushed ice I squeezed the juice of a quarter of an orange, one of three which Hirotsu Senssei (former Buddhist-Shinto priest, the one teacher who speaks really graceful Japanese, with flourishes and superhonorifics) brought us this afternoon. The oranges which grow on this island are the size of the largest Californias and have a rough skin, but are juicy and have many pits like Floridas. When green-skinned (As this one was) but nearly ripe they are orange inside, have a strongly scented skin which looks as though it would make excellent marmalade, and taste like a combination orange and lime. The one I tried just now was quite an improvement over straight coke, and would have been even better with a jigger of rum. Hirotsu also bought in a ripe sour sap (I may have called it “sourgum” before, incorrectly) - a pulpy, fibrous fruit whose flavor suggests both a lightly sour orange and a ripe peach. As Tel remarked it would make good ice cream flavoring. It is a soft [?], rather shapeless fruit, very white inside when ripe. Just now on my windowsill are hanging the pineapple I had on my desk for several days (Kirby [pg 3] Etter said it should ripen more even tho it had turned from green to orange all over); and a green mango which is gradually turning yellow. All the fruit I've mentioned is picked where it grows wild, though pineapples are under cultivation at the MG. farm. Either the Nisei's or the teachers find it on their trips around the island for natural science teaching materials, plants for the 2-acre teaching farm, etc. (That burp you just heard was the orange. Rather a nice flavor) Today to my desk came a monthly report of the MG unit of the island Walter is on and with it a personnel roster: in it I found, to my surprise and pleasure, Jacobziner's name. Had I known that when I wrote Donald Egbert (Columbia 7th Section) with Helen's letters. I would have addressed Jake instead, since he might be able more easily to contact all the hospitals. But I'm sure the letters will get there all right. 10 pm Until about 20 minutes ago, I felt cheated. I went to bed at 7:30 tonight, despite wanting to write you a long letter and also planning to go see “The Men Who Came to Dinner” (starring [M?] Hart) tomorrow night, because [pg 4] an average ten days of going to bed at eleven (never very late) and getting up at six was beginning to convince me that one solid eleven hours of sleep would be a good idea - and I did feel tired - but evidently it was too much of a shock to my system, for I lay awake for an hour getting sweater and sweatier and soaking the sheets (it's still very hot) and finally at 8:30 got up again. By then I wasn't up to writing, tho; so I read most of the clippings you've sent me to date and the article on Saipan in Far Eastern Survey. Twenty minutes ago, the movie over and under the Officers’ Club opening up, I went there for a nightcap of the last two shots in my bottle of Three Feathers which I brought out the other night to commiserate those certain departures. Alcohol at the right time is a wonderful blessing; besides enjoying the taste of it going down (With the last quarter -section of orange and a half glass of coke) I know that I'll sleep well and awaken refreshed. (Can't write you in the morning because of censor duty.) Darling, I loved that recent batch of letters - I do so wish I could sit down with you right now to talk them over instead of answering them [?] you, too, but it just isn't [?]! I love you Warren [pg 5] Thurs. 8 a.m. Post-Office (after censorship duty) Mornin' Sweetie- Guess I didn't make it very clear as to why I had felt cheated - until 20 minutes before (but not any longer) - Those two drinks hit me fast and left a very pleasant feeling; I went to sleep so fast that if I’d attempted to write another page I would probably have probably settled down for the night in my armchair and halfway thru it. That hour that I lay in bed had its pleasant side, despite the unusual heat; I felt relaxed rather than restless, but just day-dreamy, and I thought of you and of us back in the fall of ’42. Do you know, darling, my image of you as you were then has become a very special and precious part of me: it is a bright image. You have changed a great deal since then, but you have grown from that same person (I don't think in terms of any dichotomy between you as then and as now), and if I love you so much more now it is not because I love any less the memory of you then. It is, as I said, a very special feeling I have, the recollection of something freshly and poignantly beloved which has grown into something familiarly beloved and increasingly so. Tel (on duty with me; the third member of our censorship trio was Charlie) has left to get a haircut, and since I don't know whether Arthur is holding down the school office I had better get there soon. I love you, my darling Warren
