Cu-Chi, Monday, April 28,
9:30 pm:
Another hot, humid day today
and the power was off for two hours this morning. It's been sort of slow
anyway for a couple of days.
Charlie tried to
sneak up on
us earlier but the gunships and
jets chased him off in a hurry. I got my pictures back today
that I thought would be too dark.
Well they still turned out OK. So I'll drop a couple in my letters this
week.
(Editors note: Janet wrote
me that she was cutting out all the
parts of my letters that talked
about sex or other R rated things. I
guess I wrote a lot because
most of my letters
are missing at
least part of a page and some are really cut up bad.)
I guess I'd better be
careful about what I write
if I'm being censored. You'd better stop working so hard on your mom's house and
take a little more care of my kids. I
don't want them to know a cross mother.
I think we'd
better stick to
stainless steel silverware
instead of sterling - that is,
unless you want to polish it
every week or so. I can't see
putting $400 out for a bunch of silver spoons and forks when for $20 I can get the same
thing in stainless steel. Think about it. But I'm still trying to get the bronzeware anyway. The rumors are getting heavier about us pulling
out in July or so. Who knows?
My brain won’t function tonight
so I'll have to call it quits for now.
I hope you had a nice
birthday and don't really feel a year
older already. Stay young for me.
p.s. What would you like for Mother’s day?
Cu-Chi, Tuesday, April 29,
l0:45 pm:
Guess what I did tonight? I shampooed my hair when I took my shower. Pretty good, huh? The days and weeks are flying by but the months drag on
it seems. Anyway
the eagle s--ts tomorrow and it's my last April in this hole.
We got a little
rain tonight. About enough
to get everything damp
but not much
else. It was about
105 degrees here today. I had my
fan blowing on me all day but it felt like a hair dryer or
blast furnace.
I received my
knife and compass in a little package today but no letter because the mail
didn't come in.
I hope you liked your mink hat I
sent you for your birthday, if it ever came.
It's cute and would look
fantastic on your lovely little head.
I noticed on
the news clocks tonight that you're now on daylight savings, which makes
us nine hours different.
I'm
so tired physically that my brain won't
function. And besides that, nothing
exciting happened here today. Lan loved your picture and showed it to
all her girlfriends as they came in today. You know, of course, that I fell in love all
over again when I saw it.
Cu-Chi, Wednesday, April 30,
10:45 pm:
I
just took my shower and
I'm ready to slip
into dreamland. I went
home teaching this evening and walked halfway around
Cu-chi. My district
covers the middle section of
Cu-chi but most of the names I
have, have left already.
Well dear,
I read that all
the action is
here northwest of Saigon.
Well, that's us but don't worry. Charlie has only about 19
more days to launch his last offensive before the rains halt the
action for six months. So for 19 days things should get warm but then,
nothing! We got our
first taste of monsoon rain this evening. The wind picked up to about 30-40 mph and the dust
storm was followed by big raindrops
coming in like machine gun fire. These tin roofs really make a racket during a
rainstorm. But after
the rain it smelled so fresh and clean that I just
took a deep breath, and you know what?
I could take a
deep breath and my lungs didn't hurt like in Los
Angeles. I'm not suggesting we move
here but the air is a lot cleaner.
That my tape recorder won't wind up the tape
sounds to me like the rubber pulley is broken or slipping. I could fix
it in a few minutes if I were home but I guess you'll have to rough
it. Of course you could use
Kerry's tape recorder but use
only one track on each side (#1 & #3). Whatever
you do, I love you.
I
have to rest my tired bones for
now. After I
sent you the money
today I realized I only had $10 to my name. But by the time you get this
letter I'll have made plenty to
keep me going.
So don't worry about your
skinny husband.
I miss you terribly but
rumors are heavy about Hawaii in July.
p.s. Every letter has to have a p.s. but I didn't really know
anything to write here, so I won't.
Cu-Chi, Thursday, May 1,
10:00 pm:
Happy Birthday Dearest,
I
hope this day has been happy for you and filled with pleasant surprises.
May each and every year bring you more satisfaction and love than the
previous one.
I
played your tape three times the night I received it and again the next
night when I made a tape for you.
I loved your every word but if I
failed to mention it I'm sorry.
I've been hoping to get another
but so far nothing has come.
I
got the "care" package today
so it came airmail anyway. Most packages do so don't worry. The only thing I noticed was that our ESP
broke down somewhere and you sent
me popped popcorn when I
was expressly thinking of just plain old kernels because we have a popcorn popper here. But, I
still love you and we took the popcorn to the movie tonight (Racquel
Welch "Fathom") and ate a whole bag of it with cold Pepsi to drink.
The only thing missing was you and the car.
Someone
pulled the all-time joke at the
show and fell to
the ground like
there were mortars coming in and you wouldn't believe how fast 100 guys
can scatter for cover. It was funny
afterwards but you can believe I
was moving out double time. (Note: a
mortar round just hit somewhere
close but just made my heart
jump one extra beat - no
damage.)
I'm
glad the mailman and your mom got the
package before you. I
left a note on it hoping they
would so you could be surprised. I
guess it's safe to send you the bill so
you'll know what it is.
I was
hoping to get into Saigon tomorrow and call you but my ride fell through
so I guess I won't make
it.
sure would have liked to
talk to you again.
I guess I'll have to
send another tape and talk a little bit to Jonette since she is old
enough to understand her daddy now.
I am losing weight because my skin is getting loose. I hope to
get down to l85-190 before I see
you again because you
think skinny men are sexy and I guess you know what you like. Thank you for the goodies, my precious,
but next time make it crunchy Skippy, OK?
Here I've
been singing Christmas songs
all day thinking about coming home
to you. I hope you still want me.
I guess
it's time to
say my prayers and get some sleep.
I love you very much.
p.s. Here's a kiss for your birthday. xxxx
Cu-Chi, Saturday, May 3,
7:30 pm:
It's
decision making time for you my dear.
It's going to be a hard one to
make but here's the choices for you.
Choice #1: I stay in Vietnam until December 15 or
December 1, we take our R&R in Hawaii
in September and miss each other for nine long months. Or;
Choice #2:
You find me a college in Los Angeles
that will accept me as a student and will let me register on or about September 20th. Then I
will leave Vietnam September 15th and be home to you for good, go back
to working at the fire house, move
home, no R&R, no more tax free money, etc.
I know
you're looking forward to Hawaii but we'll still get there
someday. I know this puts a lot of responsibility on you but it's
worth a try
I guess, because I really want
to come home. I hate it here.
See
what you can do. Most
colleges will break the rules
to get someone out of Vietnam.
All I need is a letter of
acceptance and it must include the last day I
can register. You have
my power of attorney so you can
apply for me and I was going to
Valley last or Glendale. You might
drop by one or the other and
tell them the situation and see what they say.
I leave it up to you either way
but I do miss you terribly.
Movie
time - see you later.
"Wild in
the Streets" was really wild.
About a youth take over of the USA, etc. Lots of scenes
of Hollywood, etc.
Later - Mac just came over to discuss religion and
we had a nice chat. Mac is a real
religious person who blesses each meal and makes me feel like I'm doing something
bad 'cause I don't.
I
love you dear but I'm so tired I'd better
get some sleep. I
hope you can come up with
something from one of the colleges, an acceptance letter or something.
Maybe if I pray real hard
tonight!
I can't wait for your tape
to get here so I can hear your beautiful voice again. I'm sad that a lot of my last tape didn't record the
first time because it explained how hard I tried to call you from
Saigon on your birthday. But all
my rides fell through and left me stranded here in
Cu-chi.
Nothing
more to add.
(Editors note:
The next letter should precede this one but due to limited memory in my
computer it wasn't possible to
rearrange them after discovering the error.)