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#92 Wednesday 3 Jan. 1945 7 pm Gosh, darling, it's good to get mail from you on successive days even if the letters are mixed up. This morning I received #98 (Dec 18th). I really prefer answering each letter as it comes, but because so often they've been arriving in bunches, I've got into the bad habit of holding off saying anything about my current doings until I’d answered your letters - just to be sure not to forget anything. That system can get rather cut and dried and kill the spontaneity of letter writing. However, tonight I'll make an effort to catch up on all your back ones and will hope that, with the holidays over, mail will start coming in more regularly again. Back to your #94 (a wonderful long letter) - do write more about Marge Mulligan as you get to know her. Glad you've happened into her. Would rather leave the telling about the fancy characters (what more I know) till I get home: that is, about the man who drew (or painted) them and the one who originally chose them to [fit?] our names. The rest is self-explanatory, isn't it? Your suggestions for mounting them are good; any one of the three (grass, [m?] cloth or parachute silk) would do, or they could be mounted on a paneled screen and shellacked over. We'll do something with them. (I had the texts put on separate title pages so that we could keep them to ourselves, more or less) Sorry your gum ration has run out! We haven't had any in a long time. #96 - fun reading about the five of you plus three babies walking along the street eating sugared doughnuts. All those little details are good to hear, sweetie, and I can picture you so well. (If I skip over a lot of things that don't particularly call for an answer, it's not because I don't enjoy hearing them. Just want to get on) Speaking of Parents’ Magazine and sending me clippings, be [pg 2] sure to mark “Return” on any you want to keep if there are any. Darling - I’d love to take over washing Wendy's hair as well as yours and I’d love to do the latter right now. [?] for [?] the [?] about the camel's hair sweater - I agree that a shopping spree when I get back would be more fun. (As for here, I haven't even had occasion to wear that black sleeveless slipover that I brought. Wear nothing but very lightweight tropic greens that we were issued in Hawaii, plus occasionally khakis. Have had one suit of each cut down to shortsleeves and shorts. Always the same shoes, over heavy socks - high, comfortable [?] shoes made of unfinished leather with a sort of cord sole. A lot of men wear undershirts, but not being outdoors a lot I don't perspire very much and it's more comfortable without them. Our one satirical freedom is a choice of five hats (or none at all though we’re supposed to wear them): visor cap, overseas fore-and-aft, a green baseball-style cap, tropical sun-helmet, and steel helmet. I wear my web belt with .45 and sheath knife, cartridge case, first aid kit and caution during an air raid alerts, on all searches for outside personnel in camp, when I go out as guard on a reburial detail, etc.; otherwise don't bother but have to keep it around. Those items plus my aluminum banded watch and wedding ring constitute free dress.) Since I don't think I've ever given you a description of what we wear, I'll continue outside the parenthesis, which makes me feel a little cramped. - Among the rest of the things we were issued in Hawaii are a full bedroll: folding out, mattress, blanket, sheets, mosquito netting and poles - all except the last 3 items being still on their way here; gas mask; flashlight, mess kit, sowwester raincoat and hat, poncho, and a lot more stuff. Some of the non-essentials are also still on the way in my second seabag (I wish it would hurry and get here so I could open my two other Christmas boxes!) and I can't remember them all. [pg 3] #97-had I known you and Wendy were not having Christmas stockings, I should certainly have managed to get two of them together in Hawaii! But then, I had more ideas than I had time to do anything about. Sweetie, I will take you for a special walk sometime soon and tell you all about it. Even when I'm not busy I couldn't always do it because this existence has become monotonous and prosaic and often I do not see the human or humorous side to it, at least to the extent when I have the patience to describe it. But every once in a while I have an especially vivid dream about your or something such which brings me back to a quicker sense of life and to the generous feeling that I could maintain so much more easily were I with you - and it's then that I like to write you about little things you’d enjoy here. I expected to miss you, darling, but I never realized how empty a feeling it would be. As I've said before, I'm not going to go stale, not any more than the average person here, but I definitely do not enjoy it on the whole. #98, the one I got today - After hearing about how cozy the little room upstairs is I particularly hope you won't be too disappointed if Helen isn't coming as seems likely. Charlie said she likes her bookstore job and is reluctant to give it up after all. - Do you suppose you might get up to San Francisco (to visit Mrs. Conrad) with the Bensons? Last night I finally moved from the Operations Office, exchanging living quarters with Evan Davis, and into a tent with Charlie F. Riley Ewing (our predecessor at 2E) and Coach Hager. It's good to get away evenings from the place where I work. Moreover, though I have learned a lot [pg 4] from Johnny Reif and like working with him in the daytime well enough, he is not a good personality for me to be around all the time. There three are. It was the butterscotch cookies which came thru well. I'll write more about my English classes in another typed letter. Despite the many copies, its primarily you whom I think of when I write them. (This pen is tedious to write with, only somewhat less so than my last and as such has long been a disappointment. The matching pencil jammed a long time ago. I'm putting aside ten bucks and will grab the first [Parker?] [?] that comes this way, as they do occasionally in small numbers - even if its’ a fine point, I can get the point changed later on. A good pen is such are important item these days!) Pleasant to hear about your passing General Stilwell and again [?] Brooks on the street. Congratulations on learning to make smoke rings - “after all this time.” It's more than I can do. Thursday 7:45 am Sweetie- At that point Zas came in and started a conversation. I like talking to him so I gave up trying to finish the letter and we went over to the Officer's Club for a beer. Have just now finished censorship duty (every week or ten days) and must hurry to get this back to the mailman. I love you darling Warren Was going to write Wendy a letter last night, too - Give her a special hug and a kiss for me, darling. Seven months old! Can hardly believe it.
