10 December 1955

Dear Folks

Don’t know why I’m writing this at all---you haven’t gotten any of my letters (as of 2 Dec.) & I’ve been writing every single day & sending them airmail. Yours get here in eight days with just a plain old 3-cent stamp. It’s all very discouraging, like having a broken telephone speaker & hearing someone say "Hello? Hello? Hello?" & not being able to answer. You say you wait every day for a letter—well, so do I—every time I expect to see "Finally got your seventy-two letters…" but instead: "Why haven’t you written?" It’s enough to make a man bitter (as if I weren’t already.)

To show you the perfect timing of this cursed postal system, I received today a package from Aunt Thyra. In it were a box of Pixies & as card saying "Happy Birthday." At the same time came a card from Pleasantville, New York, saying I was to receive a year’s subscription to Reader’s Digest as a Christmas gift (thank you, mom). The saving feature of this was the thought that I’ll be out of this damn Navy before the subscription runs out!!

No sense in trying to write more—it’d be perfectly useless. I think I’ll stop sending my journal home too,--every now & then I’ll send a blank sheet of paper home giving perhaps the vital statistics on my health & welfare. And if you don’t get this one—I give up.

Till August 12th

Love, Roge

P.S. I HATE THE NAVY!!!

Merry Xmas

P.P.P.S. This is my last letter (or try) till I hear you’ve received some of mine.