March 18, 1945

Sunday Mar 18

Dear Mother:

I wrote to Mary yesterday but the letter won't go out till this one does so you will get two letters today.  I sent Mary's to B.U. so if she is on the ball she will get hers at school today.  I thought that in that way I could write two letters and not crowd the Stoneham mail.

The Independent has been coming very regularly.  It comes on Wednesdays or Thursdays so I get the news while it is relatively new.  All mail takes about 3 days which is as good as it was in Lincoln and a lot better than when I was further West.

I have several things on my mind but I can't think of them all at once.  One thing is that it is getting warm here and summer uniforms will be in style again soon.  I would suggest that you get my clothes cleaned up and fit to send because I may want them soon.  It gets quite warm here during the day.  In fact it was 75 F. yesterday and made me think spring was here.  We will need the Summer clothes before I leave since we are scheduled to leave on May 16 which is considered the summer in uniform regulations.  If you could clean up everything now and send them I am sure I could find place for them.  If you do could you find some kind of a clothes bag to keep the blouse in to keep it away from all this coal smoke.

I hadn't realized that grandma was 89 years old.  Maybe you reminded me some time ago but it must have slipped by somehow.  I wish I had sent a card.  Maybe I shall write a letter instead.  I have some Chamber of Comm. literature I could put in which she might enjoy.  She is so interested in such things.

I sure would like to bring the crew to Boston some time.  However there is little hope for such a thing.  It might happen if we flew across instead of going on a boat.  If we flew we would go the Central route which has a refueling stop over at Nashua N.H. or some place like that.  Then it might be possible if we had bad weather to be grounded for a few days and then everyone could come down and see Boston.  If we go by boat we might leave by way of N.Y. although the last shipment from Lincoln went through Boston.  It would be a troop movement and no one could leave and there are few chances of having a layover because of weather.

Training goes on as usual except weather gives us a break every once in a while.  It seems that the weather in this part of the country has a bad tendency to be bad a lot of the time.  It doesn't rain all the time but the ceilings are too low to take off.  We have to have 1500' ceilings before we can leave the ground.  Often they reach 1000' but that still keeps us down.  When you get up rested and ready to fly it kind of makes you mad to sit around doing nothing.  It seems I always want to fly but the crew is content to see bad weather.  I don't blame them too much because they don't have much to do in the air.  I believe today we won't fly because it looks like rain so we will have to sit down on the line for 5 hours or more waiting for the weather to break or looking at G.I. movies I have seen a dozen times.

I really don't have many ideas for letters this morning.  Last night I could have written a book but today I am short of words.  I really don't have time to write either because it is time to eat and then go to the line.

Meals around here are not too hot.  They cost 50 cents apiece but are not too filling.  If I get fat or gain any weight at all it will be because we have access to other food at the officer's club and at a cafeteria.  I spend most of my money nowadays on cleaning and eating.

Next month I get $396 pay which is going to be quite a windfall.  I now have $144 check and another $140 in cash which makes me a rich man now.  You will probably get about $400 next month as I have nothing which I need to spend money on.  I already have too much of everything.  

Well I must close now because I am short of time, paper and words,

With love

Austin  .