BY-WAYS 4/11/46 - Visit to the eye specialist and lunch - Tuesday, April 2.

Just to fool Old Man Procrastination I'll start the column early in the week. In my little red wagon I'm collecting a few bright stones of wit and wisdom - and little bits of this and that - to pass along to you. Saturday Virgil and I were downtown at the eye specialist's - for a routine check-up. The mailman came in with the morning delivery. Dr. Monson's secretary, in her starched white uniform, handed him a package to mail - a stocking box. "There's plenty of postage on it, isn't there?" she asked. "Yes, but you'd better have it insured. That package looks like nylons, and nylons are being swiped right and left - even from the mails." Her black eyes twinkled. "This is just an April Fool joke for a friend who has wailing for stockings." Then she confided to me that her box contained doll stockings - about three inches long.***

Across the street Virgil and I had the luxury of lunch in a restaurant, always a welcome change for a housewife. At the long, low lunch counter, a beautiful young woman sat down at my left. The March wind had played pranks with her hat, as it had with mine, and gave us an opening topic of conversation. "You grip your purse with one hand, and then you don't know whether to hold your hat or your dress with the other." "No problem at all. Hold your hat. Your dress won't blow off." This young Catholic woman, who had married a Protestant, is one of a few supremely happy mortals. She and her husband respect each other's religion, love each other unselfishly, and have an awareness of all their blessings. Her widowed mother lives with them, since she is an only child. "My mother is an angel," said this lovely daughter. "I cherish every day that she is spared to me. My husband loves her like his own." In the meantime our lunch had arrived, and Virgil said to the waitress in that nice, confiding way of his, "My wife likes lots of cream in her coffee, and I like very little, so you give her my share." The not-so-young waitress took a second look at him - and then at me. Her eyes went warm and kind. She smiled, "Isn't that nice?" Yes, it's a lovely world - with a gallant husband at your side.

Sunday morning our incomparable Preacher, Dr. Harold Cooke Phillips, took for his text the words that the angel of the Lord spoke to the godly centurion, Cornelius, in a vision. "Thy prayers and thine alms are come up for a memorial before God." (Luke 10:4) "Christianity has two hands," said Dr. Phillips, "one for devotion and one for giving." It was pledge Sunday, the only Sunday in the year when we have a sermon on giving to our church; the one Sunday when, according to tradition, the squeamish members of the church "go to hear another preacher," as Dr. Phillips said. But our church was packed that day. Which speaks well for both preacher and members.***

Mother goes out on the back porch every morning, to see if it is going to be warm enough to eat out there. One warm day last week she sat out there in all her glory - for lunch and supper. She listened to a gentleman robin make love to his girl. She (mother) declared that they made love in French; for every time that Sir Robin proposed, his lady-love would answer, "Oui;" at first soft and shy, and then as her lover grew more ardent in his mating call, she answered with all her little bird heart, "Oui! Oui!" ***

As for my heart, right now it's deep in the heart of Texas; for in addition to having a son, ("the apple of your eye," as he likes to sign off sometimes) down in San Antonio, along comes a new tug at the heart-strings in the form of an invitation from both my sister Mary and 'brother' Knox to visit in Austin during Knox's visit there, which begins on the 6th. He is going to fly there. "Oh, had I wings of an angel!" (Or 150 spondulies for the plane fare). To impress Virgil Jr. with what a grand time I had in Saltsburg early in March (and to save writing) I sent him a clipping of the BY-WAYS the one full of "chicken and turkey and steak dinners," etc. He replied that he showed it to his flight leader, who is from "Katanning," as Virgil spelled it. Then this fellow had the gall to say that the worst ham sandwich he ever tasted was made in Saltsburg. Arise, ye sons and daughters! In righteous indignation. Such libel on our fair city! ***

Now it is Saturday. And I will close with some words of wisdom that I snitched right off the wall in the office of a business friend of ours. They were prepared by Walter Williams, who, by his enthusiasm and amazing business ability, built the Sherwin-Williams Co., paint manufacturers of Cleveland into an internationally-known organization. He wrote:4/18/46 - Ike Visits Cleveland MERIT BEGETS CONFIDENCE. CONFIDENCE BEGETS ENTHUSIASM. ENTHUSIASM CONQUERS THE WORLD.

Enthusiastically yours,
Florence B. Taylor

Next - 4/18/46 - Ike Visits Cleveland
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