Dear Ex:
Like an answer to a maiden's prayer comes your letter of yesterday. This war business makes us all so serious that, in order to keep the balance, we have to take an antidote of mirth every now and then. Not that your letter is light and frivolous; far from it. In it you tell of three nephews already in service, three more awaiting the call, and one enlisting in the navy. (Besides a near-17-year-old just rarin' to join the air service). There is no merriment in your letter; but no groaning, either. Just the typical American attitude. "We've got a job to do. Let's go to it." A message from you conjures up smiling ghosts of the past. Not pale, shrunken ghosts, but two plump girls - oh, about 16 and 17; one with twinkling eyes and the soul of an imp (a good imp); the other with the gaping eyes of a hick and the soul of a fraidy-cat. I wish I had some of your letters here - the ones written before the last war - not for publication; - just to give the laughter-muscles a good work-out, lift my spirits, and bring the mental refreshment that we all need. Those letters were such gems of wit that for years I lugged them around with me, stored them in various attics, hauled them out and read them at house-cleaning time. (Virgil must have wondered why it took me so long to clean the attic). Finally, when we were about to move in with Virgil's sister for a time - I builded me an altar to the Goddess of Good Housekeeping, and offered up my treasures. It was a terrible mistake - for that goddess has never smiled on me yet. However, nothing can take away the memories of our school days together. Just for fun let's go back to the day we met at I.S.N.S. (Indiana State Normal School), that great, imposing mill of the gods, into which little hayseeds like us were poured. The millers added some Latin, geometry, English literature, pedagogy, etc. - a dash of psychology; gave us close scrutiny and a good shaking down now and then. We came out big bags, labelled, "SCHOOL MARM, Ship to the nearest vacant school house." But to go back to that first day. We had met only once before - for a brief moment at Conemaugh Church - but we had arranged through your married sister to become room-mates. Where did we meet that first day? How did we find each other that day - and for many days thereafter - like orphans in a wilderness.
Speaking of "delusions of grandeur," as you do in this last letter, do you remember the alluring school catalogue, showing beautiful girls in charming rooms, cozy scenes in the Red Room, the Blue Room, the statue-bedecked corridors? Boys and girls strolling in Lovers' Lane, etc.? Ah, me! My guardian had had quite a chummy correspondence with the principal, Dr. James E. Ament. I was assured a most cordial welcome and a room in that "castle of my dreams." How was I to know that some underling used a rubber stamp with Dr. Ament's name on it? Nobody welcomed you and me with open arms. And we were told - kindly but bluntly - that there were no rooms left in the dormitory. We must go to a "cottage." Not a sweet little vine-covered cottage on the edge of the campus, either, but a dingy old house, 'way downtown - with the dead end of the railroad tracks as our romantic vista. Your small, well-arched feet never gave you any trouble. But to one whose pedal extremities had gone unhampered for so many years, and had thus spread generously over the "good earth," that long walk on a hot cement sidewalk in my new patent leather shoes was positive agony. The priests of Bali (or wherever it is) who walk on red-hot coals had nothing on me. The worst of it was that my torture was prolonged for a week. My trunk got lost in the shuffle, and arrived a week later. My corns dug in so deep that I'm sure they took root in the bones, and stayed with me the rest of my school days. The one gracious person I remember out of the sea of strange faces that first day was lovely, brown-eyed Selma Konald, a new member of the teaching staff, who acted as guide on the trek to our new quarters, while we "portered" our own heavy suitcases. For at least a year I maintained a special adoration for her, who answered so tactfully the inane questions from my untutored tongue. Why couldn't you have said or done something stupid: And why did you have to remember all the boners I pulled? You tell this story - although I don't remember a thing about it; but I hold fast to the conviction that it was the logical thing to do: After we were ensconced in our charming sleeping-and-study quarters we walked back to school to get our class programs and our books. I can still see (and feel) that stack of books and materials that became my daily impedimenta, Latin, algebra, zoology, English grammar, and drawing (We now call it Art). Well, for drawing there was a large pad of manilla paper, a large pad of gray paper, a box of water-colors, crayons, ruler, drawing pencil, etc. For some inexplicable reason I carried all accessories without benefit of container (except my paws); going down the main walk - with thousands of eyes focused on us (or so it seemed) - the ruler would glide earthward; bend over, and the paint box would slide out - and maybe disgorge a brick or two; stoop over again - and by that time the books were parting company. Well, I still maintain that the first day I really used my head. We had our books. But I refused to hobble down to The Cottage and back again for dinner; but where to leave the books? The safest place - and the handiest place - would naturally be in the private office of the head of the institution. So - according to your infallible memory - I strolled through the secretary's office and on to the open door of that inner sanctum, Dr. Ament's office. (The name is pronounced Awe-meant - with definite accent on the 'awe'). There I asked to leave our books in the corner. The wish was granted.
Did you ever have a tete-a-tete with His Royal Highness? That was my first and last. He never spoke to ordinary students - except en masse. His smiles and quips were reserved for the star football players, the long-legged track winners - like "Lengthy" Myers - and his wife's sorority sisters. As for would-be-friendly little me, passing him in the hall, he always looked at me the way Augustus Caesar would contemplate a beetle.
Nostalgically yours,
Flo. - Florence B. Taylor
4501 Lilac Road,
South Euclid, Ohio.
Next - 2/12/42 - Mile O'Dimes. Gladys and Elwood. The "Twins"