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National Museum, Wash.D.C.
7 Feb.1947.

Dear Doris:

I am glad you are beginning to enjoy living up there, and making a lot of new acquaintances. Your account of your evening at the International Centre sounds very fascinating. But I want to tell you that you mustn't judge these foreign young men as you do your own countrymen. They have an entirely different training. Whereas in this country the young man expects the girl to entertain him, in Europe it is exactly the other way. The youth is trained to the notion that he must be the one to be nice and entertaining and very polite. He has wonderful manners usually. That is why so many of our American girls have fallen for the penniless dukes and barons and small titled foreigners. Underneath, is just precisely the same human nature, only in Europe it is more calculating. Enjoy your acquaintances but don't take them too seriously. Ina is far wiser to chose a straight-from-the shoulder American boy, who is planning to work for his living here, and not in a country which has no future for many generations. She wants her children to come up in a land full of milk and honey and not in an impoverished land with no opportunities. If you want a really happy marriage, chose someone who has had similar background to your own, with similar traditions, similar training, who will speak the same language in all ways.

This morning I bought some warm slippers to send home to Grandma for her birthday. They aren't very beautiful to look at, being large and lined with fleece, but should keep her old toes warm, and I am going to send them off immediately so she will have them to wear during the cold days. It is a bit warmer here to-day but we are promised an old granddaddy of a day by Sunday that will put all our other cold days in the shadow. I am trying to think up a warm place to spend Sunday, -- other than in Arlington, Va. We can't get our room above 50 in coldest weather.

The English Lit. notebook is on the 3rd shelf down of the bookcase in the living room, and I should think around the middle. I think the back is light leather colored, and has Eng.Lit. printed on it, I am sure. The notebook came from the old Y.M.C.A. in Boston which was burnt down while I was at school and the water-soaked remains of supplies were sold rather cheaply, so I got a good notebook.

I don't know whether I can find any alarm clocks here. I haven't seen any. But maybe you could run onto one in Boston, - it is nearer the source of supply up in N.E.

Dad at last got a new battery, but it cost $27 plus to have it put in and all. On top of the $25 he had just spent, and the college and the income taxes and a life insurance policy, he has been having some tall bills. Still he will get over $50 back on that income tax of last year, it has been decided. So don't worry, but go easy.

Love, 

Mother.