O.V.S.
Thursday evening
My dearest dear - these days drag by in a flash. Half of me is too rushed to do anything I want to properly - and the other half misses just the look and sound of you so badly that, if I think, I can feel my heart inside me get tighter and tighter with aching and it presses against the back of my eyes - until I have to think my hardest about something else, in case I cry (and it doesn't even help to say there's nothing to cry for) I'm afraid I'm a bit of a weakling - but it's something to explain it to you - because more and more I come to realize that men's and women's feelings in love are very very different - so one of the safest things to do first is to find out and understand what the other person feels, so that you can fit in.
It's strange what a vivid picture I have of how we'll treat each other when we're married. It's much more me coming to live in your life than you mine - but they're very separate lives, all the same. I hope, in some ways, they won't be quite as separate as I picture them, but I'm quite convinced the most ideal kind of friendship between two people is one that doesn't make too many demands on the other - and yet has a limitless fund of interest in the other.
Darling - it would be one of the most wonderful things if you had a room in Richmond (and, from the look of the advertisements in the local paper, it ought to be easy to get one) - but Fulham and the Finance Committee worry me a bit. Not because (and this will always worry me more) I can make myself care very much bout people being unfairly turned out of their homes in Chelsea - but because I have got so used to thinking of you as encased in a layer of magnificent ambition for the good of mankind; that if it was through me that it got broken, it would break my heart too. So, if there's the slightest chance of your coming to Richmond and spoiling one of the tings I love best in you - I'd much rather you stayed where you are - and if ever afterwards an occasion ever arises when you want with all your heart to do something for me - and yet it means leaving one of the best parts of yourself behind - please, please, just explain to me and don't do it. Because I'm such a selfish person sometimes, and I'm always sorry for it afterwards.
I loved going to Aunt Mildred's - and would have liked to have written & thanked her (specially as it was their last bottle of champagne!) - but I thought perhaps it might have looked a bit silly.
Miss Cross took us for a lovely picnic yesterday - But she drives so badly she gave me the willies all the way. We saw her cottage and she's rented it for 3 years at £45 a year. It's in most wonderful repair and much nicer inside than out. It's not really at all picturesque but really very nice. She bought a Dalton's weekly which I looked at - it simply makes your mouth water - cottages & flats by the million - a flat in Elleker Gardens, Richmond for 17/- a week!
I have had "The Bride's Book" sent me by the Evening Standard - it's really quite nice with heaps of nice useful hints as to how to get stains off furniture and clean carpets and blank pages to put in your own hints and recipes etc: I'll show it to you on Saturday.
We come back to school next term on Sept 22nd - so if you could wangle yours on the 14th - we could go to Wensley (if they ask me) - on Friday Sept 11th for a week - which would be lovely - or anywhere else with you would be wonderful.
I haven't had time to clip much into my "English in Love" - but I'm frightfully thrilled with it. Than you so much.
It's Walton Regatta on Saturday - I was thinking we might buy the Richmond & Twickenham Times & meet for lunch at 1.30 - & look at rooms for fun in the afternoon. But I suppose it would be nicer to go down to watch the racing in the Dinghy (if it's warm)
- Oh - my very own dearest dearest dear you seem such a long long way away - and I don't seem to be able to see nearly enough of you - I suppose you'll be too busy tomorrow evening to ring me up? - that would help Saturday to come a bit nearer. - If not, Saturday morning before 9 is best.
I love you so very very much.
- If I could see you for 10 minutes it would be all right - but I suppose I can wait.
Mary Pleasant xxx
Sunday, 22 May 2016
Monday, 9 May 2016
9th May 1936 - Terrick to Mary
35 Nevern Place
S.W.5
9th May 1936
My Darling,
How hot it is! I have just come back from a Socials Committee and made up my accounts. We have done well, and are getting up a dance for Saturday 27th. That means that I shall come and see "As You Like It" sometime during the week.
A funny thing happened today. I sat all day in the Conference Room & just knocked at the door of the Administration next door and put my head in whenever I wanted something. Stonelake mentioned to Ashe that I knocked on the door but did not dare say that I put my head into the room. Ashe said "Good Lord, he mustn't go into the passage at all. He must thump on the wall between the rooms when he wants anything". So I did all day, but I told Stonelake that at about 6p.m. long after Ashe would have departed I wanted to come into the administration to get some papers for tomorrow that no one else knew how to collect. Stonelake said O.K. in any case if I saw Ashe in the corridor as I came out of the conference room I could go back but he always leaves the office before 5. So I did it. I was in Administration collecting my things when the door opened and who should come in but Ashe. Stonelake went scarlet and I felt I did too. I haven't felt like it since I was caught wandering about one of my prep schools in the dead of night. Ashe only said: "Well how is the pariah?" and asked Drew a question and went out again, but I bet there will be trouble tomorrow for Stonelake. He is going to get in his say first. Isn't it foolish!
Darling, in that second-hand shop I was telling you about I have just seen some wonderful chairs, table and sideboard in natural oak. Also the chairs I was telling you about have got arms - like this
only it leans back not forward as I have drawn it. I wish you could see them; couldn't you come up before the shop shuts on Friday? And then we could go back to Richmond together to "Midsummer Night's Dream". They are also selling off a manufacturers stock of carpet at 40% his price.
I took your camera to Kodak, after haggling a bit and saying it was our fault the assistant at length took the camera behind the scenes to an expert, and then said they would keep it till Saturday and see to it.
I have just heard form the Poly Friendly Society that they will pay all my dentist's bill & 15/- of the 18/6 of my optician's. Wonderful, isn't it!
Let me know how soon you can come up on Friday. I'll probably spend the early afternoon at the Museum or the Records Office.
It was wonderful hearing from you yesterday evening. I wish you were here now.
I have all sorts of dreams of us two in the future when I am travelling in the bus. Probably not at all the type of future you would like - too much struggle and strife (not between us) attached to it.
I must stop now and write to a man about a dance band for a dance.s
All my heart and the love in it.
Your
Terrick
S.W.5
9th May 1936
My Darling,
How hot it is! I have just come back from a Socials Committee and made up my accounts. We have done well, and are getting up a dance for Saturday 27th. That means that I shall come and see "As You Like It" sometime during the week.
A funny thing happened today. I sat all day in the Conference Room & just knocked at the door of the Administration next door and put my head in whenever I wanted something. Stonelake mentioned to Ashe that I knocked on the door but did not dare say that I put my head into the room. Ashe said "Good Lord, he mustn't go into the passage at all. He must thump on the wall between the rooms when he wants anything". So I did all day, but I told Stonelake that at about 6p.m. long after Ashe would have departed I wanted to come into the administration to get some papers for tomorrow that no one else knew how to collect. Stonelake said O.K. in any case if I saw Ashe in the corridor as I came out of the conference room I could go back but he always leaves the office before 5. So I did it. I was in Administration collecting my things when the door opened and who should come in but Ashe. Stonelake went scarlet and I felt I did too. I haven't felt like it since I was caught wandering about one of my prep schools in the dead of night. Ashe only said: "Well how is the pariah?" and asked Drew a question and went out again, but I bet there will be trouble tomorrow for Stonelake. He is going to get in his say first. Isn't it foolish!
Darling, in that second-hand shop I was telling you about I have just seen some wonderful chairs, table and sideboard in natural oak. Also the chairs I was telling you about have got arms - like this
only it leans back not forward as I have drawn it. I wish you could see them; couldn't you come up before the shop shuts on Friday? And then we could go back to Richmond together to "Midsummer Night's Dream". They are also selling off a manufacturers stock of carpet at 40% his price.
I took your camera to Kodak, after haggling a bit and saying it was our fault the assistant at length took the camera behind the scenes to an expert, and then said they would keep it till Saturday and see to it.
I have just heard form the Poly Friendly Society that they will pay all my dentist's bill & 15/- of the 18/6 of my optician's. Wonderful, isn't it!
Let me know how soon you can come up on Friday. I'll probably spend the early afternoon at the Museum or the Records Office.
It was wonderful hearing from you yesterday evening. I wish you were here now.
I have all sorts of dreams of us two in the future when I am travelling in the bus. Probably not at all the type of future you would like - too much struggle and strife (not between us) attached to it.
I must stop now and write to a man about a dance band for a dance.s
All my heart and the love in it.
Your
Terrick
Saturday, 7 May 2016
7th May 1936 - Terrick to Mary
35 Nevern Place
S.W.5
7th May 1936
Darlingest,
The film is nearly perfect! The processor describes it as "slightly over-exposed" and "overexposed" and it certainly is in bits, but not, as far as I can see very seriously. Your dress has come out a dazzling white and the white round the dining-room window is rather glaring, & the washing, but I think that with a full size picture it will look all right. All the longer shots look perfect, though one can't tell without projecting. The scene in the consulting-room looks marvellous. There is not sign of the outdoor world in it at all. I should think that with the two ends of the ping-pong tables we might do without interior shots for quite a time.
I was very surprised that the film was over-exposed. I would have bet a pound that it would have been on the under-exposed side. I was particularly afraid of the green ping pong bat. Remembering how black the grass had come out in the scene of Inge rolling over and you pouring out the water jug, I felt sure the board would be too dark. It is just right. I am crazy to see it projected.
I spent this afternoon in the Public Records Office, a fascinating place. One of the books I asked for absolutely floored me: (a) it was a manuscript in old-English writing (b) it was in Latin (c) every other word was abbreviated unrecognisably. I gave it up and concentrated on the stuff that had been translated and printed. One interesting new line of inquiry that I found was that a place called Church Staunton somewhere in the diocese of Salisbury was once called Staunton FitzHugh because the FitzHughs had been lords of the manor.
When I came out I would have come down to Richmond but by the time I had got the film from Selfridge - it was only just ready - it was after five, and as I have to be at a political branch meeting at eight in Chelsea and have dinner I should not have had much time with you.
Tomorrow I am catching the 10a.m. coach from King's Cross arriving at Luton at 11.30, then on to Bedford and Eaton Socon (the parish where Begwary is). In the Victorian History of Bedfordshire the house is described as "a very dilapidated half-timbered structure, the bricks between the framing being laid in herring-bone fashion, while the windows are filled in with double-hung sashes and the walls covered on the outside with plaster. The roof is of slate, and the building is partially surrounded by a moat". It sounds attractive doesn't it. Referring to the "ancient manor" the county History says: "It's site is probably marked by 'Begwary Farm' in existence to the present day".
What is the number of you car? & did your mother come up in it? Oh, no of course she didn't, I remember now! But as I was coming from the Records Office I saw a car the exact double of yours in (I think it was) Lincoln's Inn Fields.
Write to me, dear. I have now one hundred and sixty-seven letters and cards from you, including ¾ of one that you tore up.
I am so sorry that I shall see so little of you this week-end. Can't I come to the Shakespeare Society party? You didn't seem very anxious to have me.
When I rang up your mother to ask if I could borrow a camera, she asked me for the number of this house as a letter had come for me addressed care of her - obviously as a result of the announcement. It arrived to-day marked: "Personal. Please Forward". I was a bit mystified at the stress laid on it, but I wasn't when I opened it. It was from some birth-control people soliciting my custom!
Three people in this house have now congratulated me.
I have got the super reel. Unless you particularly want to be present I will wile away the long Sunday without you by stringing together the odd films.
I wish you all the best for to-morrow morning. I didn't know you were going up so soon. You can tell me how you have got on when I see you at about 8 in the evening I don't think I'll be later than that, but you can understand that after trying so long to get up to Begwary, Eaton Scoton and the other places, when I do I don't want to have come away without seeing anything.
Goodbye till tomorrow, darling.
All my love
Terrick
S.W.5
7th May 1936
Darlingest,
The film is nearly perfect! The processor describes it as "slightly over-exposed" and "overexposed" and it certainly is in bits, but not, as far as I can see very seriously. Your dress has come out a dazzling white and the white round the dining-room window is rather glaring, & the washing, but I think that with a full size picture it will look all right. All the longer shots look perfect, though one can't tell without projecting. The scene in the consulting-room looks marvellous. There is not sign of the outdoor world in it at all. I should think that with the two ends of the ping-pong tables we might do without interior shots for quite a time.
I was very surprised that the film was over-exposed. I would have bet a pound that it would have been on the under-exposed side. I was particularly afraid of the green ping pong bat. Remembering how black the grass had come out in the scene of Inge rolling over and you pouring out the water jug, I felt sure the board would be too dark. It is just right. I am crazy to see it projected.
I spent this afternoon in the Public Records Office, a fascinating place. One of the books I asked for absolutely floored me: (a) it was a manuscript in old-English writing (b) it was in Latin (c) every other word was abbreviated unrecognisably. I gave it up and concentrated on the stuff that had been translated and printed. One interesting new line of inquiry that I found was that a place called Church Staunton somewhere in the diocese of Salisbury was once called Staunton FitzHugh because the FitzHughs had been lords of the manor.
When I came out I would have come down to Richmond but by the time I had got the film from Selfridge - it was only just ready - it was after five, and as I have to be at a political branch meeting at eight in Chelsea and have dinner I should not have had much time with you.
Tomorrow I am catching the 10a.m. coach from King's Cross arriving at Luton at 11.30, then on to Bedford and Eaton Socon (the parish where Begwary is). In the Victorian History of Bedfordshire the house is described as "a very dilapidated half-timbered structure, the bricks between the framing being laid in herring-bone fashion, while the windows are filled in with double-hung sashes and the walls covered on the outside with plaster. The roof is of slate, and the building is partially surrounded by a moat". It sounds attractive doesn't it. Referring to the "ancient manor" the county History says: "It's site is probably marked by 'Begwary Farm' in existence to the present day".
What is the number of you car? & did your mother come up in it? Oh, no of course she didn't, I remember now! But as I was coming from the Records Office I saw a car the exact double of yours in (I think it was) Lincoln's Inn Fields.
Write to me, dear. I have now one hundred and sixty-seven letters and cards from you, including ¾ of one that you tore up.
I am so sorry that I shall see so little of you this week-end. Can't I come to the Shakespeare Society party? You didn't seem very anxious to have me.
When I rang up your mother to ask if I could borrow a camera, she asked me for the number of this house as a letter had come for me addressed care of her - obviously as a result of the announcement. It arrived to-day marked: "Personal. Please Forward". I was a bit mystified at the stress laid on it, but I wasn't when I opened it. It was from some birth-control people soliciting my custom!
Three people in this house have now congratulated me.
I have got the super reel. Unless you particularly want to be present I will wile away the long Sunday without you by stringing together the odd films.
I wish you all the best for to-morrow morning. I didn't know you were going up so soon. You can tell me how you have got on when I see you at about 8 in the evening I don't think I'll be later than that, but you can understand that after trying so long to get up to Begwary, Eaton Scoton and the other places, when I do I don't want to have come away without seeing anything.
Goodbye till tomorrow, darling.
All my love
Terrick
Friday, 6 May 2016
6th May 1936 - Terrick to Mary
35 Nevern Place
S.W. 5
6th May 1936
My Darling,
Well, are you thinking of me less? I expect you are now thinking of me a lot less than I think of you. Still I shall have plenty of opportunity after midday tomorrow as I have got a holiday from then till Monday morning. On the other hand perhaps that won't make much difference to the amount I think of you. You see I already think of you in all my unoccupied moments. The catch is that I am seldom unoccupied. From one minute to another I am always engrossed in one of a few things. Travelling in buses & tubes and lying in bed, eating and talking to people who do not interest me I think of you.
Tomorrow afternoon I shall go to the British Museum. On Friday I am going to Begwary (the way the present directory spells Beggary) by bus; Green Line to Luton and local buses to Bedford and beyond. I shall stop in Bedford and look up something in an index of old wills that they have there. I have rung up your mother and asked her to lend me one of her cameras, so Jill is bringing it up to Raeburn House tomorrow evening, then I can take a photograph of the old house if it still exists and send it to my father. The directory of Bedfordshire mentions the hamlet of Begwary but funnily enough gives no list of inhabitants. If it is deserted I shall plant the FitzHugh standard there and take possession under the banner of the hoggets and shirlings.
Renny rang me up today, he wants to know for certain if he is to come down this week-end and if Bodil is coming. I told him I would ring you up tomorrow and find out. He wants to come.
I am very tempted to get a Dekko film camera, giving our present one in part exchange. There is so much more that one can do with a better lens and with different speeds etc. On the other hand a better lens will mean that a light meter will be absolutely necessary. At present we can be pretty certain of being right if we have the aperture full open, but with 1.9 lens we should over-expose if we did that, & we should have to guess the other stops if we had no meter. Also I should have to wangle our titler to suit a different camera or get another one. My dealer would allow me 50% on our present titler. What tempts me to do it now is that Dekkos have just gone up by £1 and I can get one of the pre-rise ones. I could pay the difference between cameras by instalments.
Just now I am collecting silver paper to make light reflectors to save paying 7/6 each for them. I am funny in one direction I plan to spend one & in another, quite independently, I try to save it.
It is hot!
I find that my short story classes this term are on Thursdays so that will fit in nicely with your Shakespeare. This day last year was Jubilee Day. The weather has been rather the same hasn't it.
I'll ring you up tomorrow some time in the morning.
Goodnight my dearest of dears.
Terrick XXX
S.W. 5
6th May 1936
My Darling,
Well, are you thinking of me less? I expect you are now thinking of me a lot less than I think of you. Still I shall have plenty of opportunity after midday tomorrow as I have got a holiday from then till Monday morning. On the other hand perhaps that won't make much difference to the amount I think of you. You see I already think of you in all my unoccupied moments. The catch is that I am seldom unoccupied. From one minute to another I am always engrossed in one of a few things. Travelling in buses & tubes and lying in bed, eating and talking to people who do not interest me I think of you.
Tomorrow afternoon I shall go to the British Museum. On Friday I am going to Begwary (the way the present directory spells Beggary) by bus; Green Line to Luton and local buses to Bedford and beyond. I shall stop in Bedford and look up something in an index of old wills that they have there. I have rung up your mother and asked her to lend me one of her cameras, so Jill is bringing it up to Raeburn House tomorrow evening, then I can take a photograph of the old house if it still exists and send it to my father. The directory of Bedfordshire mentions the hamlet of Begwary but funnily enough gives no list of inhabitants. If it is deserted I shall plant the FitzHugh standard there and take possession under the banner of the hoggets and shirlings.
Renny rang me up today, he wants to know for certain if he is to come down this week-end and if Bodil is coming. I told him I would ring you up tomorrow and find out. He wants to come.
I am very tempted to get a Dekko film camera, giving our present one in part exchange. There is so much more that one can do with a better lens and with different speeds etc. On the other hand a better lens will mean that a light meter will be absolutely necessary. At present we can be pretty certain of being right if we have the aperture full open, but with 1.9 lens we should over-expose if we did that, & we should have to guess the other stops if we had no meter. Also I should have to wangle our titler to suit a different camera or get another one. My dealer would allow me 50% on our present titler. What tempts me to do it now is that Dekkos have just gone up by £1 and I can get one of the pre-rise ones. I could pay the difference between cameras by instalments.
Just now I am collecting silver paper to make light reflectors to save paying 7/6 each for them. I am funny in one direction I plan to spend one & in another, quite independently, I try to save it.
It is hot!
I find that my short story classes this term are on Thursdays so that will fit in nicely with your Shakespeare. This day last year was Jubilee Day. The weather has been rather the same hasn't it.
I'll ring you up tomorrow some time in the morning.
Goodnight my dearest of dears.
Terrick XXX
Thursday, 28 April 2016
28th April 1936 - Mary to Terrick
Dunally Lodge
Shepperton
April 28th
My dearest dear - I hope you are quite well - as I am - and that two days without hearing from me has not undermined your constitution in any way. If you could calculate all the time I spend each day thinking of you, you'd blush for shame thinking what an idle woman you must have chosen - but I can do other things at the same time! - although, of course, one of them has to suffer a bit in consequence.
Flip & I spent yesterday out together at the dentist and buying his outfit in Dean Street W.1. we passed your place at exactly 1p.m. - just to cheer me on my way a bit! Then we had to do some shopping in Kensington & Flip had been promised he could go to the pictures - so we went to the Hammersmith Gaumont - got in at 2.30 and the programme lasted until 6.10!! - so you can imagine what I felt like when we got out. But the films were quite passable and a jolly good Silly Symphony.
Are you booked up anywhere for Friday evening? Do you think I could come and see you then? It doesn't really matter - because, as Mummy says "you'll see him on Saturday" - but it's another 24 hours anyway. I'm driving Mummy up to the office on Thursday - and we're going to see "These Three" - but I've got Shakespeare in the evening - so that's no good for seeing you.
I've asked Grannie particulars about Saturday & she says arrive about 5.30 - so you could go to your British Museum, couldn't you? - I think it finished about 7.30, and we shall probably all come home together afterwards. is it settled with Paul about dinner next Sunday? Because Jack is driving Mummy down to a friend at Brighton for the day - so we shan't be able to have the car. Could you ask Paul the best way to come? It is a pity it isn't Saturday after Grannie's.
I ordered the photographs yesterday - and they'll be 10 days. I'm longing to see yours up in your room. Couldn't you have one of yourself taken for a birthday present for me? Or had you already planned to give me a saucepan-cleaner?
- Did you remember we'd been engaged a month yesterday? My ring looks as if it's lived there all it's life now - and it felt frightfully strange when you first put it on.
It has been wonderfully hot here all today. I went to sleep in the sun after lunch, and have been sewing since then. Mummy has gone to bed early with a streaming cold.
I had a very nice cheery letter from "the Commander" this morning - but it's a pity about the exclamation marks.
I'm getting to the pitch, when, because my feelings remain at the same high pitch continuously, I have to repeat myself or else say nothing at all. You mean so much more to me than I can ever write down (even with copying it out afterwards) that I can only tell you how much I long for the time when I can show you my love instead of inadequately trying to tell you about it. In these blissful and magical days it's one of the best thoughts I have that one day my love for you will even be a deeper and more wonderful thing that it is now.
- With you beside me life would be almost too magnificent.
I don't know what I've done to deserve anybody as wonderful as you.
- I love you -
Mary Pleasant.
Shepperton
April 28th
My dearest dear - I hope you are quite well - as I am - and that two days without hearing from me has not undermined your constitution in any way. If you could calculate all the time I spend each day thinking of you, you'd blush for shame thinking what an idle woman you must have chosen - but I can do other things at the same time! - although, of course, one of them has to suffer a bit in consequence.
Flip & I spent yesterday out together at the dentist and buying his outfit in Dean Street W.1. we passed your place at exactly 1p.m. - just to cheer me on my way a bit! Then we had to do some shopping in Kensington & Flip had been promised he could go to the pictures - so we went to the Hammersmith Gaumont - got in at 2.30 and the programme lasted until 6.10!! - so you can imagine what I felt like when we got out. But the films were quite passable and a jolly good Silly Symphony.
Are you booked up anywhere for Friday evening? Do you think I could come and see you then? It doesn't really matter - because, as Mummy says "you'll see him on Saturday" - but it's another 24 hours anyway. I'm driving Mummy up to the office on Thursday - and we're going to see "These Three" - but I've got Shakespeare in the evening - so that's no good for seeing you.
I've asked Grannie particulars about Saturday & she says arrive about 5.30 - so you could go to your British Museum, couldn't you? - I think it finished about 7.30, and we shall probably all come home together afterwards. is it settled with Paul about dinner next Sunday? Because Jack is driving Mummy down to a friend at Brighton for the day - so we shan't be able to have the car. Could you ask Paul the best way to come? It is a pity it isn't Saturday after Grannie's.
I ordered the photographs yesterday - and they'll be 10 days. I'm longing to see yours up in your room. Couldn't you have one of yourself taken for a birthday present for me? Or had you already planned to give me a saucepan-cleaner?
- Did you remember we'd been engaged a month yesterday? My ring looks as if it's lived there all it's life now - and it felt frightfully strange when you first put it on.
It has been wonderfully hot here all today. I went to sleep in the sun after lunch, and have been sewing since then. Mummy has gone to bed early with a streaming cold.
I had a very nice cheery letter from "the Commander" this morning - but it's a pity about the exclamation marks.
I'm getting to the pitch, when, because my feelings remain at the same high pitch continuously, I have to repeat myself or else say nothing at all. You mean so much more to me than I can ever write down (even with copying it out afterwards) that I can only tell you how much I long for the time when I can show you my love instead of inadequately trying to tell you about it. In these blissful and magical days it's one of the best thoughts I have that one day my love for you will even be a deeper and more wonderful thing that it is now.
- With you beside me life would be almost too magnificent.
I don't know what I've done to deserve anybody as wonderful as you.
- I love you -
Mary Pleasant.
Sunday, 24 April 2016
24th April 1936 - Mary to Terrick
Dunally Lodge
Shepperton
April 24thd 1936
Dearest Ticky
With much thought on the matter in the last 24 hours (for obvious reasons) - I have discovered three main causes from which our future disagreements will probably spring.
(If you're not feeling in the mood for this kind of idle prattle I should leave this until later)
- Now and again when driving myself in the car, I like to ponder on our middle age. Our youth is destined to be so magnificent (as it has been for 3½ years) that it only needs "relishing" and not "pondering". But I often consider (quite seriously) what a terrific responsibility "marriage" is. I don't mean the usual kind of responsibility - money and children - but the responsibility each of you suddenly takes upon yourselves for the welfare and happiness of another single individual (absolutely and entirely different from the comparatively small responsibility one has as a member of a family).
So it really seems to me a great help to try and imagine what unexpected pit-falls you may have to come up against, and what you would do if you did - and it's much more fun to tell you too - and for you to tell me, because that way we might avoid them altogether - or we might even find them funny if we met them:
The pit-fall that I (probably in common with the rest of the world) always put first, is "money" because there are so many ways of treating it and when it's gone it's so gone - (I have a feeling it would be easier to put steps down the side of this "pit" - we shall be in it so often).
- The second is my tongue which has never in this life ever thought twice before it said exactly what it wanted to - I'm frightfully sorry about it - and I put some of the blame on having been brought up in a family where everyone is as bad. But that doesn't mean to say I can't improve - and a few months back I tried very hard for about a week - and now I'm just as bad as I was. This is one of my stupider sides, darlingest, and it's a good job you know too much about it already. Perhaps if you told me about it when I was doing it, it might make a difference.
- The third point is, and this is quite a new one (and rather original, I thought!) your digestion. Now I know mine isn't too good, and I may suffer quite as much as you - but a middle-aged woman with indigestion is twenty times more companionable than a middle-aged man. (Don't as me on what I found my statement - but it's what I imagine). I had quite vivid pictures of you the other night - not as being fat - but thin and irritable and bad-tempered - and you kept on worrying about what you were having to eat. It was the kind of picture that made me feel that one day it might quite easily come true (I'm sorry I'm being so rude) - and then I remembered how you had indigestion even now in these days - so I'm filled with foreboding!!! Do you think we can do anything about it? Or don't you think there's much need to worry? - It might quite easily be the other way round, of course!
- I haven't got very much longer before the post goes - and I'm horrified to think how bored you'll be by this time - I can't understand what it is urges me to write to you when I've nothing to say!
I'm glad you got my message about the "Morning Post" - we didn't see it ourselves until we got home. it was jolly decent of them, wasn't it? I wonder if it'll be in any more. I haven't heard from the Yorkshire Post people yet. The one of us both is the one I'm longing to see. Can't we ask them about it again?
Shepperton
April 24thd 1936
Dearest Ticky
With much thought on the matter in the last 24 hours (for obvious reasons) - I have discovered three main causes from which our future disagreements will probably spring.
(If you're not feeling in the mood for this kind of idle prattle I should leave this until later)
- Now and again when driving myself in the car, I like to ponder on our middle age. Our youth is destined to be so magnificent (as it has been for 3½ years) that it only needs "relishing" and not "pondering". But I often consider (quite seriously) what a terrific responsibility "marriage" is. I don't mean the usual kind of responsibility - money and children - but the responsibility each of you suddenly takes upon yourselves for the welfare and happiness of another single individual (absolutely and entirely different from the comparatively small responsibility one has as a member of a family).
So it really seems to me a great help to try and imagine what unexpected pit-falls you may have to come up against, and what you would do if you did - and it's much more fun to tell you too - and for you to tell me, because that way we might avoid them altogether - or we might even find them funny if we met them:
The pit-fall that I (probably in common with the rest of the world) always put first, is "money" because there are so many ways of treating it and when it's gone it's so gone - (I have a feeling it would be easier to put steps down the side of this "pit" - we shall be in it so often).
- The second is my tongue which has never in this life ever thought twice before it said exactly what it wanted to - I'm frightfully sorry about it - and I put some of the blame on having been brought up in a family where everyone is as bad. But that doesn't mean to say I can't improve - and a few months back I tried very hard for about a week - and now I'm just as bad as I was. This is one of my stupider sides, darlingest, and it's a good job you know too much about it already. Perhaps if you told me about it when I was doing it, it might make a difference.
- The third point is, and this is quite a new one (and rather original, I thought!) your digestion. Now I know mine isn't too good, and I may suffer quite as much as you - but a middle-aged woman with indigestion is twenty times more companionable than a middle-aged man. (Don't as me on what I found my statement - but it's what I imagine). I had quite vivid pictures of you the other night - not as being fat - but thin and irritable and bad-tempered - and you kept on worrying about what you were having to eat. It was the kind of picture that made me feel that one day it might quite easily come true (I'm sorry I'm being so rude) - and then I remembered how you had indigestion even now in these days - so I'm filled with foreboding!!! Do you think we can do anything about it? Or don't you think there's much need to worry? - It might quite easily be the other way round, of course!
- I haven't got very much longer before the post goes - and I'm horrified to think how bored you'll be by this time - I can't understand what it is urges me to write to you when I've nothing to say!
I'm glad you got my message about the "Morning Post" - we didn't see it ourselves until we got home. it was jolly decent of them, wasn't it? I wonder if it'll be in any more. I haven't heard from the Yorkshire Post people yet. The one of us both is the one I'm longing to see. Can't we ask them about it again?
Tomorrow Mummy & I are leaving here at 2.15. So can you meet us at Richmond Station per usual at 2.45? It will save you taking your case to the office in the morning won't it? So if you don't phone we'll pick you up then. I think the weekend should be quite fun - don't you? It'll be marvellous having you to myself again for a bit. I miss you so terribly every day now.
- Goodnight, very dearest dear - you'll never understand what you mean to me.
Your very own
Mary Pleasant xxx
24th April 1936 - Terrick to Mary
Thanks for your letter, which arrived safely.
CERCLE DES ETRANGERS
DE MONACO
SALON DE LECTURE
LE 12th April 1936
I'll see what can be done about this (!) week-end
My Own Mary,
The first day and a half was such a whirl of busy-ness and settling the clients into the programme that I didn't notice much that you weren't there, but now the thought butts in upon me in my busiest times: Oh if Mary were here how she would laugh - or: what a good story she would make of that.
When my one disagreeable client is doing her disagreeableness, and I am groping mentally for the diplomatic answers, the idea of your taking her off makes me see how funny she really is. And when my diplomacy comes off I think: I wish she had seen that.
The journey down went off very well. It was hard work because there was only one dining-car, but there were only two meals and a few services of tea to serve, and a splendid lot of assistants to help me.
But the stay in Nice itself is not nearly such fun. I think being away from you is responsible for that in more ways than are immediately obvious. Last year Paul and I just had a frivolous time. This year my idea of a good time is so completely connected with you that I don't expect or try to enjoy myself much, except in so far as I enjoy ripping for it's own sake.
I am sitting writing this in the Casino at Monte Carlo. We are running the trip twice this year instead of once so that this has cut out an evening of writing to you. But now that I have explained the games to a fair number of people I have left them and have "found out a way".
Today it has rained cats and dogs since early morning, and is still at it (10.45p.m.) It has messed up one of the fêtes but only an unimportant one. Tomorrow is the Battle of Flowers so it mustn't rain - besides my clients at the Hotel Everest are complaining of the cold today and the proprietress refuses point blank to put on the central heating.
I am sleeping in a bathroom that only has a window looking out onto a pitch dark passage, so that when I wake up in the morning everything is pitch black and I haven't the foggiest idea until I look at my watch, whether it is day, night or next week.
I have been to the shop where I got your bangle last time but they haven't got anything like it. It was fashionable at the time.
Dean & Dawson's conductor on the train is normaly Raymond Whitcomb's man, and he gave me some useful inside information. Apparently the Asst. Manager has just given notice because he doesn't get on with Pontin, the Manager. They are just moving to large offices in Berkeley Square, and business is looking up. I shoujld probably be wanted for the Foreign Independent Tours Dept. (just what Pontin told me) and my salary - at a guess - would be £5 or £6 to start with.
Interesting.
I must stop writing now because in five minutes we start for home.
The roof of my motor coach has become so saturated with rain all day that it leaks - much to the displeasure of some of the clients. Fortunately all my Cavallero people are very nice.
Next morning
A free morning before the Battle of Flowers. The sun is shining gloriously and the party are brightening up again.
This morning I woke up and realised that all I wanted was to get back to London and you as quickly as possible. I had looked forward to coming here because I enjoyed last Easter, but I omitted from my calculations how much water had flowed under our bridge since then. I didn't mind being away from you for a week then, but now I mind it as much as I minded being here away from you for eight months in 1933. I am sitting in the Brice writing this and for a moment three years seem to have rolled back and I am telling you you love me while you are answering that you don't - and saying it in such a way that I am only more certain that you do.
But now it is in many more ways that I miss you. The little details of the ordinary day demand your presence to be properly enjoyed. I don't - as I suppose I did in 1933 - wish for you to go out dancing or sight-seeing with, I want you just to sit, stand and walk next to me, my darling friend.
At the Brice there are some people who were with me in 1933. One of the first things they said to me was to ask whether I was married yet to the girl I wrote letters and postcards to in '33.
I must stop now and do some work. I wanted to get this letter off to you before but even our evenings have been busy. I take more part in the organising work than I did last year.
All my eyes and all my heart are for you alone.
Terrick xxx
CERCLE DES ETRANGERS
DE MONACO
SALON DE LECTURE
LE 12th April 1936
I'll see what can be done about this (!) week-end
My Own Mary,
The first day and a half was such a whirl of busy-ness and settling the clients into the programme that I didn't notice much that you weren't there, but now the thought butts in upon me in my busiest times: Oh if Mary were here how she would laugh - or: what a good story she would make of that.
When my one disagreeable client is doing her disagreeableness, and I am groping mentally for the diplomatic answers, the idea of your taking her off makes me see how funny she really is. And when my diplomacy comes off I think: I wish she had seen that.
The journey down went off very well. It was hard work because there was only one dining-car, but there were only two meals and a few services of tea to serve, and a splendid lot of assistants to help me.
But the stay in Nice itself is not nearly such fun. I think being away from you is responsible for that in more ways than are immediately obvious. Last year Paul and I just had a frivolous time. This year my idea of a good time is so completely connected with you that I don't expect or try to enjoy myself much, except in so far as I enjoy ripping for it's own sake.
I am sitting writing this in the Casino at Monte Carlo. We are running the trip twice this year instead of once so that this has cut out an evening of writing to you. But now that I have explained the games to a fair number of people I have left them and have "found out a way".
Today it has rained cats and dogs since early morning, and is still at it (10.45p.m.) It has messed up one of the fêtes but only an unimportant one. Tomorrow is the Battle of Flowers so it mustn't rain - besides my clients at the Hotel Everest are complaining of the cold today and the proprietress refuses point blank to put on the central heating.
I am sleeping in a bathroom that only has a window looking out onto a pitch dark passage, so that when I wake up in the morning everything is pitch black and I haven't the foggiest idea until I look at my watch, whether it is day, night or next week.
I have been to the shop where I got your bangle last time but they haven't got anything like it. It was fashionable at the time.
Dean & Dawson's conductor on the train is normaly Raymond Whitcomb's man, and he gave me some useful inside information. Apparently the Asst. Manager has just given notice because he doesn't get on with Pontin, the Manager. They are just moving to large offices in Berkeley Square, and business is looking up. I shoujld probably be wanted for the Foreign Independent Tours Dept. (just what Pontin told me) and my salary - at a guess - would be £5 or £6 to start with.
Interesting.
I must stop writing now because in five minutes we start for home.
The roof of my motor coach has become so saturated with rain all day that it leaks - much to the displeasure of some of the clients. Fortunately all my Cavallero people are very nice.
Next morning
A free morning before the Battle of Flowers. The sun is shining gloriously and the party are brightening up again.
This morning I woke up and realised that all I wanted was to get back to London and you as quickly as possible. I had looked forward to coming here because I enjoyed last Easter, but I omitted from my calculations how much water had flowed under our bridge since then. I didn't mind being away from you for a week then, but now I mind it as much as I minded being here away from you for eight months in 1933. I am sitting in the Brice writing this and for a moment three years seem to have rolled back and I am telling you you love me while you are answering that you don't - and saying it in such a way that I am only more certain that you do.
But now it is in many more ways that I miss you. The little details of the ordinary day demand your presence to be properly enjoyed. I don't - as I suppose I did in 1933 - wish for you to go out dancing or sight-seeing with, I want you just to sit, stand and walk next to me, my darling friend.
At the Brice there are some people who were with me in 1933. One of the first things they said to me was to ask whether I was married yet to the girl I wrote letters and postcards to in '33.
I must stop now and do some work. I wanted to get this letter off to you before but even our evenings have been busy. I take more part in the organising work than I did last year.
All my eyes and all my heart are for you alone.
Terrick xxx
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