Letters from Marcy #24: 6 July 1967
A brief postcard from wine country. This is just over a year after the last letter (and after Marcy’s graduation). It starts this phase of Marcy’s story in media res; there’s clearly a lot of backstory that we’re missing. I’m guessing there were other letters in the interim.
Frustratingly, during that gap she met and moved in with Peter, so I have no information about how or when they met, or how she told her parents that she had moved in with him. From the casual tone of this note and the next few, it seems clear that she had told them all that stuff before this, but if any of that was in a letter, it’s gone now.
I’m also not sure what she told them regarding marriage. Marcy and Peter were married by a friend sometime around the summer of 1967, but I think they weren’t legally married until some time after I was born. (Edited to add in 2022: According to Ancestry.com, they were legally married in February of 1968, the month before I was born.) I suspect that Marcy’s parents weren’t thrilled about that, if they knew.
(As for Peter’s parents, a later letter suggests that they and Peter had been on the outs for a while, which I mention here only because (a) George and Helen’s 30th wedding anniversary was in October 1967, so Peter apparently missed that; and (b) I have photos from Christmas 1967 that show Peter’s parents and brothers, but not Peter—I had vaguely assumed Peter must have taken the photos, but apparently not.)
At any rate, even though I’m sad to be missing the material about how Marcy and Peter met, I’m very glad to have these letters; they fill in various gaps in my knowledge of what my parents were up to in the period just before and just after I was born.
Side note: This postcard must have been written right around the time I was conceived, though presumably Marcy didn’t yet know she was pregnant.
Printed on postcard:
Conducted tours of the Italian Swiss Colony Winery
Tours start on the patio next to the statue of Bacchus, god of wine in classical mythology. Besides the tour of the historic winery, visitors may enjoy the hospitality of the tasting room. Italian Swiss Colony, established in 1881, is located in the small village of Asti, 85 miles north of San Francisco on the Redwood Highway.
Marcy’s handwritten note on the postcard:
On the way back to city, to move up to Mendocino, tasting smooth mellow California burgundy, lovely, warm, beautiful—we borrowed a fine, bouncy truck to move in.
love, Peter & Marcia
Postmark: Asti, Calif, Jul 6, 1967. For once, no notation about when it was received.