December 9, 1974

Lavinia, honey,

I hope I did not sound as if I did not approve of your plan to move back here when we spoke on the phone yesterday evening! I think it is a lovely idea! It is just that I was so shocked--and surprised. To think that you, who have traveled the world and lived in New York and goodness knows where else, would want to come back home to settle after all these years. That did surprise me, but you were always one for surprises! But after I thought about it a little last night as I was lying awake--I had gotten cold, and I turned on the electric blanket for the first time this season (Peggy gave it to me, though I told her I didn't want one, but now I can't do without it!)--I decided it wasn't so surprising after all. After all, we are getting on in years, and I suppose it is natural that when we reach our time of life we begin to want to be near to the people and places we knew and loved best as children. We need all the love and closeness we can get at our age, don't you agree? And I can guarantee that you will have that here--love.

I do hope you won't be bored, tho'! Of course, you were always such a great reader, and I know books will keep you company and occupy your mind when you get weary of us. But books can only do so much! Fortunately there is a lot else here to keep you busy. There is church, for one thing--for you that would be St. James. They have a wonderful organ, and a perfectly wonderful director of music to play it! Leonard and I used to go to their Christmas concerts, but since he died I seem to have lost interest. This year, however, Lucybell Cauthon has made me promise to go with her, mainly because she can't drive anymore and needs someone to take her--and to help her get up those big stairs on her walker. She is practically _crippled_ with arthritis, one affliction I am free of, thank the Lord! It would help if she would lose some weight--that must be murder on her knees. But I suppose eating is the only consolation she has in her declining years. Getting fat is one danger of living here, I must warn you! I had to completely swear off bread and sweet things earlier this autumn, for all of my pantsuits had gotten so snug around the middle. I did treat myself to some of Annie Maud's wonderful lemon squares at a little shower we had for her niece Melanie--I figured I deserved a reward for being so good! I helped myself to some potato chips too, though they were also "off limits!" Annie Maud had put out some sour cream dip I couldn't resist, with little chives cut up in it. She always does things up so prettily.

Melanie--the niece--is marrying a widower whose first wife was killed in a car accident here two Christmases ago. She (Ruth Ann was her name, she was the sweetest thing) was coming home after the Christmas Eve festivities in the fellowship hall at First Methodist. She was struck down while crossing Main, right in front of the church--a truck driver, and he was drunk. They couldn't even have an open casket at the funeral, because her head was severed from the rest of her body. And she had two darling little blond children! Well, the Lord works in mysterious ways, and I see His hand at work in this marriage, providing those lovely children with a new mother who I know will love and cherish them as if they were her own. Melanie is a lovely girl too, though she has a protruding front _tooth_ I wish she would see to. I said to Lurlene when we were watching a little fashion show Melanie was in at the Country Club last summer, I said, wouldn't Melanie be a _beauty_ if it weren't for that tooth! She looked so cute in those little tennis dresses she was modeling, so trim and petite. But when she opened her mouth to smile I had to turn my eyes to the pretty flower arrangements. It quite spoiled the effect!

Mercy, I have wandered away from my point again--"digressed," as old Reverend Saxon used to say about his sermons, which ran on and on until old senile Miss Wallis would holler out "What's your point?" from the back pew! Oh: the other thing I was going to tell you about was the literary club I belong to--that might interest you. In fact I talked to Eula, the president, when I called her up this morning to see how she was doing, and I mentioned that she might have a new recruit! She went on a Caribbean cruise and came back with dysentery. She is a little better now, though she still has to run to the bathroom nearly every hour--in fact she had to excuse herself to visit the toilet while I was talking to her. Anyhow we don't read anything "heavy," but we have read some wonderful books, and our discussions at our meetings can be quite stimulating! I hosted the club last meeting, and served my floating island for dessert, and that got raves, much more so than the Fig Newtons that Gladys Aubrey served last time. Somebody should have said something to her about that, but she is sort of "off" lately--repeats herself over and over--and so nobody dared. So we just munched in silence. Anyway she never could cook worth a toot, so perhaps it was for the best. She used to send egg custards over here that were practically _raw._ Anyway we read a biography of Stonewall Jackson. Next time we are reading a novel by Eugenia Price, I forget which right now, but I am enjoying it. It is sort of a mystery story with lighthouses and such--I read a little of it before bedtime every night, but I only manage a few pages before I start nodding off! Age, I guess.

Then there is the bridge club, but I don't know whether you will be interested in that. To be honest I am not sure I would recommend joining just now. We have a new member, Priscilla DeLoach, a Baptist, who refuses to play for money--not even so much as a dime--and so ruins the fun for everybody. She closes her eyes and says a little prayer before each game. Isn't that silly! Fortunately she may not be able to play for a while after she has surgery on her bunions next month, so that will give us a nice break.

As for where you will live, there are some lovely "ranch" homes on that ridge up by the Country Club that might suit you to a tee. You can see for miles and miles up there, all the way to the foothills on clear days. Alva Lee lives up there and is always complaining about the deer eating up her daffodils and such, but don't let that put you off. She is so grumpy, and stingy (she sits by me in church and puts only a quarter in the collection tray each Sunday, even though she's rich as Croesus)--just make sure you don't live by her.

Isn't it sad that you can't move back into the old homestead, which is still vacant ten years after old Mr. Ponsonby died? But I imagine you wouldn't want to fool with a house that big at your age--I don't know how anyone ever managed, they're so hard to keep up and heat, goodness knows. I feel such fondness for that house, though of course I never lived in it and rarely ever set foot in it. One time as a child some little girls dared me to run up on the porch and look in the windows, and I did, and when I got up there and peered in I found myself face to face with your mother, who was arranging some dried flowers on top of the piano. She smiled at me kindly and waved at me to come in, but I ran, why I don't know. I remember that she invited my mother in when she had stopped to admire some of the hollyhocks in the front garden, and she came home laden with all manner of plants and flowers--mother-in-laws tongue and peonies and roses and herbs and whatnot. She said your mother was so nice to her--served her iced tea in gold-rimmed glasses, and gave her a little glass fawn she'd brought back from Venice! She would never hear an ill word spoken of your mother after that, even when people said she had started getting peculiar. Goodness, that was so long ago, wasn't it? But it seems just like yesterday, sometimes!

Oh, one advantage to living here is that you will be much closer to Patricia, of course. I do not like to pass on idle "gossip," but I do not think that that marriage is long for this world, judging from I have heard from a friend who lives down there--and from the little that Patricia will let on. She can be so secretive! It has nothing to do with dear Patricia, of course, but with that Dan. I've always regretted that she married him. He has such airs and acts like he hung the moon. When they visited here last spring he spent the whole time sitting on his neck on my living room love seat (which isn't really for "sitting," though I didn't tell him so) reading while Patricia and the children and I went out visiting. And then went out and got himself a hamburger rather than eat the casserole I had spent all day making! Anyway, I pity poor Patricia and those children, though she will never let on that anything in the least is the matter. But I can tell something is wrong because she has lost weight. And she has cut her hair in the most peculiar, most unflattering way--like a boy's sugar bowl cut. She said one day she just got tired of having all that hair blowing round her face and grabbed a pair of shears and started hacking. I remember combing and braiding her lovely hair when she was a girl. It was so soft, and went on forever, all the way down to her waist. Well, I never could tell that girl a thing, she is so headstrong in some ways--except where that Dan is concerned!

Well, I have run on too long, like always, Lavinia. But let me say again how very excited I am about having you so close by again after all these years! Keep me up to date on what you decide, and know that my little guest room is open to you when you come down to hunt for a new home. I have put an electric blanket on that bed too in addition to the afghan I crocheted, so you need not be afraid about keeping warm.

My two pretty little cardinals have just come to my feeder, so that means it must be almost time for my stories. The little birds visit at nearly the same time every day, it is uncanny! At any rate I must go get a stamp for this letter before the postman comes. I am always running after him waving a letter for him to mail.

Wishing you and your family the merriest of Christmases!

Affectionately,

Evie

P.S. Some little girl at church gave me all these darling little candy cane stickers, and I am spending them all on you!