Right Handed I Could Have Trimmed Him

Friday 30 March ‘45

9:50 a.m.

 

Dear folks,

I’m out at the hospital waiting to get this cast off and since I have to wait until this afternoon I’ll write a little. Last Tues. I wrote a V-mail and an air mail. Then Wed. & Thurs. I wrote just V-mails when I was on pass. One is in pencil and they may send it on through unphotographed but eventually you will get it. Let’s see now what’s happened since Tues. I found 3 letters when I got back – your Mar. 16 air mail, Mar. 20 V-mail and a V-mail from Julius. Tues. night as I remember we had a good meal – spaghetti, hamburger, peas, bread, butter and pineapple I believe. Anyway it was good. After awhile I took off and walked into town with a couple fellows, just sort of wandered around awhile, got a bite at the Red Cross and went back to camp and to bed. I suppose actually I waste my time but still I just can’t see spending much time around camp if I can avoid it. I just want to get away from it. But enough of that. One of these days I’ll probably pour out my feelings in a 5 or 6 page letter if I happen to hit the right mood. Wed. morning I was up as usual but a bit later because rain prevented reveille. I got my early morning work out of the way, shaved and cleaned up and took off on pass. I can’t tell you too much about it because I didn’t go very far. I walked into town, ate dinner, looked the place over pretty well to see what it was like on a busy weekday. There is plenty of bustle and business, actually probably more than in downtown Lansing at the same time of day. Everybody over here is in a hurry to get somewhere or other. Then in the afternoon I caught the bus to [cut out by censor]. I spent the rest of the afternoon just looking the place over. It’s very nice, a lot better than our city. I guess it’s about the same size. The business district is much more attractive. The stores look smarter, the streets are wider, and cleaner, in fact everything seems “more awake” if I can use that term with reference to a city. The American Red Cross over there has ours beaten all the way. It’s a huge hotel which has been taken over. The theaters over there looked better from the outside in fact everything did. It would be a nice place to be. I should have gone there before but just kept putting it off. The residential sections are better I believe also and there are a couple very pretty parks that I wandered around through. All in all I like the place a lot but I’ll probably never go back. I got something to eat and in the evening went to a play at the opera house. It was “Junior Miss,” a comedy and was very good. It’s the first I’ve seen over here although they have a new one each week. The Opera House is really a nice place also. There is much more offered over there in the way of what I call “decent” entertainment. I got out in time to catch the last bus back. I stayed in town at the Red Cross and those sheets and that pillow really felt good. I slept until about 9:30 before I got up, dressed, cleaned up and ate. Then I wrote you a letter and before I knew it the forenoon was gone. It was cloudy most of both days and drizzled a little a couple times so I didn’t have much luck but did try 2 or 3 snaps. I got into a ping pong game with an English boy at the Y yesterday afternoon but got beaten by 2 points. Right handed I could have trimmed him. Yesterday I did virtually nothing. I did a lot [of] walking and saw a lot of new parts of town. I guess I’ve covered most of it by now. Then I ate supper and went to a show- “Call of the Wild” with Gable & Loretta Young and “We’re in the Army” with the Ritz Bros. & Jane Withers. I guess they were both pretty old pictures but they were good. I went back to camp last night and slept there so that’s my pass or what I can say now. Maybe someday I’ll get into more details about things but you know how it is.

Well this is developing into a good sized letter although I haven’t said much. I guess they fill up faster when one doesn’t type. It’s an off and on day today from rain to sunshine and back to rain. April must be on its way. April already & here it was Dec. just the other week.

I was going to come over here tomorrow to have this looked after but it may be pay day so I decided on today. I have quite a bit of work to do so I hope I get back sometime this afternoon. That’s about all there is to say today. Wow, it’s really pouring outside now. It’s about 11:00 and nearly chow time so I’ll call this it. Now the sun is shining. See what I mean? So long for once more until next time,

Love

Arlington

 

Later, – the cast is off but the X-ray shows the bone isn’t healing so tomorrow I come back here to the hospital for a couple days. I don’t like the idea but at least they are trying to fix it up. So if the mail gets a little off the beam don’t pay any attention to it. I’ll probably be out Mon. or thereabouts.

Son