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Oops, I forgot to post here last week. So here are two weeks’ worth of updates in my family history project.

The first letter below is also the first substantive letter after a six-month gap, during which many things happened, including moving to Santa Rosa and starting a foster home.

A quick overview of the letters described in more detail below:

• Peter writes about my new school and about an altar for our ancestors. Also includes a flyer about our church and a drawing of the altar.
• A flyer for Hearthlight (the foster home), plus a thank-you letter for many Christmas presents.
• Laundry, and human reactions to surprises and Halloween costumes.
• Thank-you notes and life updates.
• Another piece of kid art.

December 10, 1973

Peter explains why he doesn’t write often, and talks about my new school, and talks about his plan to set up an altar in our home with which to pay respect to our ancestors.

“I hope you will understand that this is done not in the spirit of lighting candles and paying a priest to pray somebody out of purgatory, but rather in the spirit of putting flowers on someone's grave.”

December 28, 1973

A flyer for Hearthlight (the foster home), plus a thank-you letter for a large number of Christmas presents, including one particularly well-liked major present for the whole family.

“I won’t thank you for the Cat In The Hat—you wouldn’t either, after 50 readings or so—but Joaquin does, profusely.”

January, 1974

Marcy has a day of many spilled items, and writes about laundry and about human reactions to surprises and Halloween costumes, among other things.

“part of me loves to be angry. Adrenalin all stirred up, emotions at a high pitch, real, real feelings, alert, senses keyed up[…]. It really feels good to be functioning at this level — all systems go, just almost maximum but no overload, and afterwards an almost post-sexual feeling of good will and contentment.”

January 15, 1974

A couple of thank-you notes and general life updates. “Life goes on here in the usual hurry-up-&-wait fashion, lurching from (minor) crisis to (near) catastrophe.”

January 16, 1974

Another piece of kid art. “Somebody was sliding up here, up the hill”