Tuesday 1-5 pm
& Wednesday
- Thank you for both letters. i'm sorry I didn't thank you more promptly - but, as I expect you gathered, every minute, up to Sunday, was full up. And it needs a good steady hour for me to even settle down to write to you.
This morning I have an acute pain somewhere inside - probably due to scanty breakfast - & it's making me feel that I'm all 'inside' - I wish they'd send me home. However, it's not so bad as it was, & I'm ?? my mind by thinking about you. - I felt they wouldn't let you come to London - so I wasn't getting a bit excited - I suppose if you had of come (sic) for a night you would have seen me - would you? - Because I believe I'm beginning to take you a bit too much for granted, you know. - It's a most queer feeling at the moment - you're becoming just what I make you - just what I should like you to be - & it's rather dangerous - because I'm losing the real you - & just writing to someone I've made up. - You see, I didn't know you very well, did I? - So it's a bit difficult - I can get all your feelings & ideas through your letters - & they sometimes jolt me back & I think - 'oh, of course, he'll always be as odd as he seemed at first - & have queer ideas that don't fit in!' & then I remember a bit of the extraordinary person I picked up (!) last winter - but that's all - I wish I knew you better - not the person who writes such nice letters.
- perhaps I will one day - do you think I shall have to go through a lot of disillusioning?
- I'll enclose that snap of me you like in exchange for the post-card you don't - it's not very good, I agree - & you might just as well have the nicer one. = Send the p.c. back, will you?
- I've been hunting everywhere for your letter about the 'fascinating' effect of your bathing costume - in fact I've been through about 50 to find it - bit it's absolutely disappeared - Anyway I bet you did look fascinating in it - or didn't you have your glasses on?
- Norah & I are now cogitating on a motor caravan holiday! - we've seen a lovely one - only it would swallow poor old Horace up - heavens knows what we should look like - but it would be great fun. - I should love to come to Dinard too - & Mummy thinks it would be topping - but, you see, it is a bit difficult, isn't it? - or perhaps you don't see - but even then it doesn't make much differences as far as Norah is concerned - from her point of view, I mean - & anyhow putting myself in her place I shouldn't like the idea of it - would you? - or do you think it's a bit of a mole-hill mountain? - But if I had piles of money I'd bring mums over - & that would be topping - only I haven't! - and you'll be home in October - won't you? (Gosh - you'll be 'Terrick the Myth' by that time!
- Do you know - of all the things in me that feel mentally; the sense that makes my imagination work most vividly is my sense of smell - the smell of curd soap in square blocks always takes me back to my wonderful week of School Certificate at Holloway Polytechinic! - I had to take it up in my case for us all to wash with & my case smelt of it for ages - I love it! - Olva soap makes the 'hate' rise up in me - Katie uses it in the office cloak room. - Strawberries open up the whole vista of summer - green lawns & sun - & just little smells here & there conjure up special occasions.
- Last week Thursday was an awful day - On the Wednesday evening - (while washing up after supper) Norah informed me the only thing I lived for was an appreciative audience - It struck hard for just 24 hours - & then I decided it wouldn't be an 'appreciative' one if I threw myself under the train! - but - oh- how beastly true it is - I've never never done anything worth mentioning that wasn't purely selfish - even now I'm not doing anything that'll help other people - I hardly ever think of anybody else - I know we weren't put here just to live wrapped up in ourselves - & here am I just a rotten mess of "me" - I supposed other people are the same (I can't think of any) - but, you see, it's only me that worries myself - & perhaps that's where I'm wrong - sort of tearing round in a vicious circle all on my own - & I don't know where to get out. It's a bit difficult, isn't it? - (This is what Hickie calls 'my physiological measles'!!)
- Are you bored to tears? - Well, do you know one infallible way I've found of cheering myself up (still about 'me', you see) - When Katie goes to wash her hands (with Olva soap) - I open my stamp book (where I enter every blessed stamp I stick onto every blessed envelope!) at Sept 15th 1932 - It was a Friday - & see how scrawly & hurried each name is down the page - and then on 16th Katie's need hand has entered up the post in quite a different feeling! - Oh how I hummed with excitement - all my cases stacked in the cloadroom with Poly. labels & Fort William stuck all over them - my clean blouse - my new hat - my camera - oh it was wonderful - nothing will ever beat it - bumping out of the office for a whole week!! - meeting Norah - buying two sprigs of white heather - a taxi to Victoria coaching station - standing in awe-struck silence, while all the luggage was stacked on - scrambling in - waving good-bye - off int Victoria & Great North Road - oh - magic magic enjoyment of youth - why can't I go back & back - until it doesn't matter what mistakes I make - because they all come right in the end - oh Fitz - I did love it so - & meeting you on the platform & following you up - & crossing the loch in the ferry boat & sitting on the front & seeing a porpoise - & climbing mountains & taking my stockings off - & not being able to climb down steep laces - & Norah was such a dear -
- perfect - perfect week - that can never never be quite the same again - isn't it sad?
- but I've still got the stamp book!
- What made you say 'how young you are' in your last letter - I never feel very young now, you know, unless you make me by laughing at me!
How long will you be at Dinard? - the rest of the summer I suppose.
- I have a sudden feeling of longing for a nice dance - somewhere expensive - & a new frock 0 & someone to make a fuss of me - what a 'feminine' inclination - but then I'm so very feminine & ordinary to the depths of my moth-eaten soul.
- Tell me, what good can I ever do? - How can I set about it? - you see, I'm so dependent on other people -
- dear old thing, I shall make you despise me, really & truly, one day, shan't I?
- Oh, Mary, shut up -
- Thank you for asking after my elocution - was it an effort - or spontaneous? - It's going fairly well - my diction & breathing are very rocky still. - They've given me the part of Mrs Malaprop in a few scenes from 'The Rivals' we're doing at a Concert in October.
- Won't Edwy soon be finished enough for me?
- Jack won his Junior Eights at rowing on Saturday, at the Chiswick Regatta - he's goat a topping cup, & we're all awfully bucked - he sends his love - by the way - although you are a Communist - or something that rebels against his conservative ideas!
- Jill also send hers - in spite of having spent today in bed, owing to something eaten over the weekend - we fear!
- Flip, in his robust & grinny manner, salutes you with the blight-killing syringe with which he is, at present, engaged on the roses.
- Mums says she would like to come to Dinard & Mr Hodson remains deep in 'Social Ethics of Economics' or something.
- Must stop & go & talk to poor old Jill
- Please, please, write soon - your letter is my 'happy haven' from the turmoil of the week!
- Think as well of me sa you can,
My love
Mary Pleasant
xxx
P.S. I had another funny dream the night after - I'll tell you one day - if I remember.
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