DIY History | Transcribe | Nile Kinnick Collection | Nile Kinnick correspondence, March-October 1943

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Nile Kinnick correspondence, March-October 1943

1943-04-24: Page 02

magazine?" It was true that I did - boldly put, I suppose I was annoyed at her interruptions. But she was so sweet and good - and lonely - that I was ashamed of my selfish indifference to her friendliness. I closed my magazine and tucked it under my leg for the rest of the trip. We talked of many things, just simple, everyday things, but I was glad that I hadn't stubbornly stuck to my reading. The dull gray smoke from the engine billowed back past the window, drifted in among the trees and underbrush, momentarily hanging there like a dense, dirty fog, then dissipating and disappearing in the clean county air. I bought two small packets of cashew nuts from the Union News candy butcher who intermittently passed through calling his merchandise in a weary, belligerent voice - one for her and one for me. She remonstrated in a most sweet and gentle manner, fumbled with snap to her pocketbook declaring firmly that it was she who should be buying for me, the man in uniform. (All of which reminded me of another dear and noble lady, loving matriarch of the happy clan of Clarke-whose last letter I still have not answered!) My companion spoke of her nephew in the Marine Corps, of her people in Hartford, lamented late spring and sagely observed that nothing would grow when its feet were cold and wet. It developed that she was a spinster, and lived all by herself in a small cottage near the sea just outside of New London. It was lonely, yes, but she usually had someone renting all but the one room she occupied, and in

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magazine?" It was true that I did - boldly put, I suppose I was annoyed at her interruptions. But she was so sweet and good - and lonely - that I was ashamed of my selfish indifference to her friendliness. I closed my magazine and tucked it under my leg for the rest of the trip. We talked of many things, just simple, everyday things, but I was glad that I hadn't stubbornly stuck to my reading. The dull gray smoke from the engine billowed back past the window, drifted in among the trees and underbrush, momentarily hanging there like a dense, dirty fog, then dissipating and disappearing in the clean county air. I bought two small packets of cashew nuts from the Union News candy butcher who intermittently passed through calling his merchandise in a weary, belligerent voice - one for her and one for me. She remonstrated in a most sweet and gentle manner, fumbled with snap to her pocketbook declaring firmly that it was she who should be buying for me, the man in uniform. (All of which reminded me of another dear and noble lady, loving matriarch of the happy clan of Clarke-whose last letter I still have not answered!) My companion spoke of her nephew in the Marine Corps, of her people in Hartford, lamented late spring and sagely observed that nothing would grow when its feet were cold and wet. It developed that she was a spinster, and lived all by herself in a small cottage near the sea just outside of New London. It was lonely, yes, but she usually had someone renting all but the one room she occupied, and in