December 29, 1943

Dear Al,

I sure hope this letter finds you Hunky Dorey because I sure am not. I’ve got a beautiful cold if you’d call it beautiful but I got one anyway so I might as well like it while it lasts.

What did you do for Christmas? I sure hope you didn’t have guard duty or whatever you call it. I had to stay home and take care of my little niece/neice (can’t make up my mind on how to spell it) while my sister and her husband (he’s a soldier) went home for Christmas to Muskegon for the weekend. You know I was telling you I come form Minnesota well I’m going back there for a visit the last of January for my birthday on the 28^th I sure hope I make it don’t you? Or do you?

Ramona stayed over night with me while my sister was gone but I didn’t have much fun anyway because Ramona has had her way so much because she’s the only one in this family that I’ve had to wait on her and if I didn’t she got mad. One night she really got mad at me but she soon got over it. Other wise she is a lot of fun and everything.

He lived in a two-family apartment and the people living in the one across from us well her husband is home on furlough this week. He’s in the Navy. She works in the defense plant while he’s gone here in Wayne.

I didn’t get so many Christmas gifts this year because I wasn’t home but they’re keeping them there until I come for my birthday but I’m satisfied with what I got. I got figure skates, compact, silk stockings, slip, (pants), stationary, ribbons, flowers, 4 silk hankies with the Navy insignia on each, red, yellow, blue, and light green, and a and a kerchief with the Navy insignia on it from the bay in Great Lakes. It sure is cute I just love it and a couple dollars from my brother in the Navy down at Norman, Oklahoma. He’s being shipped out soon and I sure wish he would get a furlough before he goes because I haven’t seen him sent he went in and that was way last March. And I sure like my brothers and sisters a lot. They’re all so good to me because I’m the youngest one and they all watch out for me. And they trust me too. So that’s a lot. Whenever I got out I tell me sister everything I do and I don’t do anything I’m ashamed of so I tell her what ever I do. You know that night we were in Detroit. Well when we got home, Ramona was walking up the stairs with her shoes off and dropped one down the stairway and it woke my sister up. Just as we were getting in bed, she came in and told me she’d talk to me later so when I woke up about 12:00 I told her we missed the bus and all we did and she just took it as a joke and didn’t say a darn thing about it. Lucky wasn’t I. Some sisters wouldn’t be that good. I had about 3 hours sleep that morning but when I got up I wasn’t tired at all but Ramona was dead to the world. Bay have I got the work to do yet. Clean upstairs, downstairs and wash the dishes and its noon already. My brother-in-law is stationed out at the Romulus Air Base and they have one of the largest planes in the world out there too its bigger than a 2 story house. In Wayne, there’s a trailer camp you know for defense plant workers well in one of the trailers there’s a soldier living that is the brother to that millionaire that’s married to Sonjia Heince. He’s quite nice looking too, black curly hair and full of dickens. I saw him at a dance in the trailer camp they have everything Wednesday night. He isn’t any different from any other person either. One of my brother-in-law’s pals gave my little niece a $25 war bond for Christmas, pretty nice wasn’t it? Well New Years will soon be here, again. I’m trying to coax my brother-in-law and my sister to let me do to Detroit with a girlfriend of mine and stay over night at her sisters house but I don’t know how successful I will be but I think I will make it. Wish you could go with us. Well I better sign off with my scribbling and very boring letter.

Love,

Vera Mae

As I look this thing over, Bay what a crummy letter.

Miss Vera Johnson

31559 Alpena Court

Wayne, Michigan

My address

P.S. I’m hoping that you will answer and send me a picture of you. Will you please? Even in your civilian clothes it’s O.K. if you haven’t any in your sailor suit.

So-Long for now and Be Sure To Write