{"id":15577,"date":"1964-12-29T00:00:29","date_gmt":"1964-12-29T00:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kith.org\/journals\/jed\/letters\/letters_from_marcy_1964-12-29.html"},"modified":"2018-01-04T06:04:38","modified_gmt":"2018-01-04T06:04:38","slug":"letters-from-marcy-1964-12-29","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/marcy\/1964\/12\/29\/letters-from-marcy-1964-12-29\/","title":{"rendered":"Letters from Marcy #1: 29 December 1964"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

Marcy wrote this when she was 21 years old. She was attending Antioch College, which had a co-op program in which students would spend a few quarters doing practical work elsewhere; in this case, she was on her way to Arizona to teach at Keams Canyon, which I think is and was part of the Hopi Reservation<\/a>.<\/p>\r\n

Here\u2019s the letter (which I previously posted as a blog post<\/a>):<\/p>\r\n

 <\/p>\r\n

\r\n
\r\n                                           [pencil: 12\/29\/64]\r\n\r\nAccept or not as you will, but I'm typing this in a plane\r\nabout to take off from Austin, to San Angelo to somethin'\r\nelse, to El Paso, where I'll have about an hour's layover to\r\nlook up an old friend from school, thence to Tucson\r\n(pronounced too-sahn) to stay with Rhodes, Carolyn's\r\nboyfriend and an old friend of mine, and his family and get\r\nthe driving test out of the way. ..... fgoog. god bless\r\ndramamine. this is a prop flight (propellor) which is very\r\ncheap and quite bumpy. My milkshake and paanutbeuuter, no,\r\npeanutbutter crackers are coming out of my ears and may\r\nxxxxx come out elsewhere pretty soon. The hop from San\r\nAntonio to here was pretty damn rough. No, nobody minds if I\r\ntype--they can't hear it.\r\n\r\nReason is, that Carolyn just got accepted to the peace corps\r\nand had to go back to school early, so her mother wouldn't\r\nlet her take three more days to drive me to Tucson (we are\r\npretty much flying on the left flank, which happens to be\r\nthe side I'm on, and is a teensybit x disconcerting.)\r\nanyway, her mother won't get to see her for two years after\r\nJune, so she's a bit reluctant to give her up. (it is a FINE\r\nlooking world out there. nothing but miles and miles of\r\nnothing but texas.) (and clouds, below us for the moment,\r\nthat really ARE torn tufts of cotton, and the sun drawin\r\nwater through them, and we go through q a t thick greay-blue\r\none, and are out and above and free          )..............\r\n\r\nanyway, the bus would have cost about ten dollars xxxx less,\r\nand taken about 22 hours longer. total plane fare $45.45,\r\nbecause I got part of the flight at half-fare, being under\r\n22. (the part from san antonio to El Paso) I still do not\r\nface with equaminity the wonder of flying, of being above\r\nthe clouds and in the blue part of the xxx sky and just some\r\nthin cirrus streaks above us and then the stratosphere, 'way\r\nup there. Stewardess says we're at 8000 feet, which isn't a\r\nlot, but it ain't a little either.\r\n\r\nMexico was glorious. We drove to Monterrey, stayed in a\r\nluxurious motel, ate out at a very very posh place (due to\r\nCarolyn's family being extremely well off) and drove up a\r\nhigh, fine mountain--with pines and firs and the whole\r\nvalley spread out beneath. Saw some fine cactus and all\r\nsorts of beautiful crafts and exciting people. Carolyn's\r\nfamily used me to buy their liquor, as they're only allowed\r\nto bring in a quart apiece, but I'm from out of state and\r\nallowed a gallon. Mrs. Awalt is a very sweet, charming\r\nsouthern lady, a lady all the way and a very very shrewd\r\nbusinesswoman. She runs a whole string of food concessions,\r\nand has done it all herself since her husband died nearly 8\r\nyears ago. Makes a damn fine living, with a new cadillac\r\nevery year. (Ick! I dislike big cars--I'll take a new\r\nHillman Minx every year, thanks, or a new Karmann Ghia every\r\n5 years. The latter is the Volkswagen sportscar. I'LL take a\r\nnew Volkswagen every 5 years too, if anyone is so\r\ninterested.)\r\n\r\nToday is Tuesday, 4:30 pm. I'LL be in Tucson by 9 tonight,\r\nand in Keams Canyon by saturday, I think. We were in Mexico\r\nsaturday and sunday. Yesterday, two of Carolyn's friends\r\nfrom High School came and took me on a grand tour of the old\r\nmissions, San Juan Bautista, San Jose, San Francisco Espada\r\n(Sword)....they were really fine places, the last one was on\r\na river, and was falling apart and exciting. We saw the\r\nAlamo, numerous times as it's in the heart of San Antonio,\r\nbut it's said to be very boring and no one cares to go\r\nexcept the greenest tourists\r\n\r\nHow is the stereo? I have lists and lists of records\r\n(mentally) I wish I could rush xxxx right out and buy for\r\nyou, and a few I'd like to buy for me...all of which I'm\r\nsure you'll hear at the end of March or thereabouts, when I\r\nget there.\r\n\r\nwhat else have I  done....hmm. Listened to lots of live\r\nFlamenco, played by some old friends of Carolyns friends\r\nfriends etc. Ate more rich expensive food than I care to\r\nthink about, and gained xxx some weight in the wrong places\r\nin the process. Drank tequila, which x is very good in small\r\ndosages. Rode around the countryside. Went shopping in San\r\nAntonio's Better department stores and bought mostly nothing\r\nbut some slacks and a bathrobe. Had an awful xx turkey\r\ndinner for christmas day, and a good texas steak last night\r\nand a lobster in Nuevo Laredo, mexico and veal steak in\r\nmonterrey and a preponderance of shrimps everywhere. Haggled\r\nin a Mexican Market, for earrings and a silver ring (15\r\npesos, or $1.26, about) and had a glorius time altogether.\r\n\r\nWe're losing altitude fast, approaching San Angelo. Next\r\nstop Odessa. Time to take a nap.. .....what a weird, pretty\r\ncity this is.\r\n\r\n[handwritten] and what a messy touchdown. Plop. We are now\r\n(in theory) spread out all over the runway and our pilot\r\nloses his job.) and there is black ink all over me.\r\n\r\n3 cheers for Trans-Texas airways.\r\n\r\nLove,\r\n\r\nMarcia\r\n\r\n[handwritten on back] YEEK! No envelopes. Keep hoping - if\r\nyou see this you'll know I found one. Happy New Year.\r\n<\/pre>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n
 <\/p>\r\n
Postmarked Tucson, Dec 31 1964. Written on front of envelope, probably by Marcy\u2019s mother, Ethel: “Rec\u2019d this 1\/2\/65.”<\/p>\r\n
\r\n
Facebook post for this letter<\/a>.<\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Typed on a plane en route to a teaching position in Keams Canyon, Arizona.","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15577","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-letters-to-parents","category-keams-canyon"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/marcy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15577","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/marcy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/marcy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/marcy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/marcy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15577"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/marcy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15577\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15877,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/marcy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15577\/revisions\/15877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/marcy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15577"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/marcy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15577"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kith.org\/marcy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15577"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}