31 December 1955
9 p.m.

Dear Folks

No mail in almost a week—what’s wrong? Every day I look for it, thinking it’ll be sure to catch up, but it doesn’t. Oddly enough, I keep thinking "Grandpa Fearn’s dead & they’re waiting till after the funeral." Don’t mean to be morbid & God forbid anything happening to Grandpa for at least fifty years. But you should write more often & let me know what’s going on.

Tonite is New Year’s Eve &, like Christmas, is just another day. There was a time—I especially remember 1944 when each year going out seemed like a major tragedy—I waited up (you’d gone to the Moose Club) & watched the year going, & wished & wished it would stay; 1945 sounded alien & unbelievable, where 1944 was old & familiar. And here it is 1955-56—the changing of a number—a new set of calendars, and a year older—nothing more. I may not even stay up to see the New Year in.

Please tell me all about Christmas, & what everybody got, & what you did Christmas Eve. And if Dad didn’t stay home all day Christmas day, I’ll be mighty displeased with him. Of course, neither of you will say, but I’ll find out when I get home (225 days!)

Have you made that picture appointment yet? I’d like both of you in it, if it can be arranged--& don’t be satisfied with the first shot they hand you if you don’t like it, have them take several so you’ll have a choice.

If it’s halfway decent tomorrow, Nick & I & a couple of the other guys are going to Pompeii—by cab. It’ll be cheaper in the long run & we can spend more time there. I like Pompeii, dead as it is, a thousand times better than Naples, Genoa, or Cannes. I’ll hold judgment on Gibraltar, & won’t include Paris, since there is only one Paris.

I’m feeling fine—my cold is still hanging on by its fingernails. Someone stole my flat-hat (my little blue bonnet) & I’ll have to wait till Wed. to buy another.

I’ve been given my own little calculator (borrowed from Disbursing) for the duration of inventory; all my very own—to love & to play with & to keep forever & ever. And I just played with it for a while. Oh, what fun! To press the little buttons & hear it hum & sing to itself as it thinks out the answer. Oh, joy! …. EH!

Someone once said a man with an abacus could beat a calculator. I’d like to try, but you would be amazed at how few abacuses (?) we have on board!

Well, tempus fugit, though I wouldn’t know it, not having a watch. By the way, that is not a hint. I’ll get one when I have the money, not until. Anyone who is ass enough to have a watch stolen right off his arm while he’s stone sober deserves to go without for awhile.

More later….WRITE

Love

Roge