Dearest Pearl,

The strangest thing, Pearl. After your story about the train-watching afternoons appeared in the Gagetown Rotary Club Newsletter I received this odd photo from a man in Kansas. He claims the giant grasshopper lived next to the scruffy apple trees that produced the green apples you audaciously salted with the purloined shaker. He further claims that the grasshopper could be incited to violence by hearing anything sounding at all like "Hail Britannia."

Have you any comment?

I Remain As Always, Your Devoted Miss Blue

I have never tried green apples with salt, Pearl! That was very avant garde I suppose? You were always so fashion forward in every way! And how you loved that little sister of yours! And she, you. I remember her tears at being left behind on those train watching afternoons. Gagetown! It was such an adventure! Didn't your father have a garden there?

I Remain As Always, Your Devoted Miss Blue

about elsie, 1926

If you see eyes big and round

One is black and one is brown

That's my Elsie Schultzenheim

If she's walking down the street

And you notice two left feet
That's my Elsie Schultzenheim

She works for a doctor

And she makes money quick

She stands right outside his door

And makes people sick

Curly teeth are in her mouth

One points north and one points south

That's my Elsie Schultzenheim

Dear Miss Blue,

How lucky you were to have found Fanny's proper papers so that the school officials would be able to recognize and admit the smartly dressed and French Braided young girl to their Upper Class School For Young Aristocratic Children from Aristocratic Families.

Of course, when you bring up our days in Gagetown, I can hardly contain myself! Yes, those were the times - chasing around the town with daylong abandon, never returning home except for lunch and even that was not too necessary since we could pluck green apples from the small apple trees growing on the hill. We brought one of our mother's salt shakers (salt was what made the small green apples so delicious, we said to one another) and there we were on the hill where the Freight Train sped by once a day and where we waited for the two railroad men driving the Hand Car to come by. They checked the tracks for broken ties and any other thing that could cause a train wreck and we would wave our apple-clenched hands at them and blow them kisses and they would wave back and doff their blue and white railroad caps at us. Our mother told us that we were never to bring our baby sister - she was only two - with us IF we planned to sit on the Sand Hill and eat Green Apples And Wave to the Railroad Men. So, we never told her - our baby sister - where we were going even when she cried, which she did.

We were sad when we had to say goodbye to Gagetown; my mother said I Never Got Over IT. I don't know what she meant by that, do you? Something about "running wild and eating better."

Love, Pearl

Remembering The Billy Goats Gruff and the Norwegian Trolls. . .they all had the same name, just different voices. . . .

Melba and I spent a frantic morning looking for Fanny's birth certificate yesterday, Pearl. She is attending a new school this fall and needed the whole rigamarole of shots and documentation. Melba is so disorganized! We finally found everything we needed in the same shoebox that had the photographs from our childhood in Gagetown. How many wonderful memories of you and me as girls came flooding back! Do you remember the summer of Billy Whiskers? How he just showed up on Mr. Feenamint's porch one afternoon? I do believe it is then that your whole love affair with goats began!

I Remain As Always, Your Devoted Miss Blue

Dear Miss Blue,

There is nothing worse than an Indolent Cat, hardly reason to praise his pounce-and-kill instincts. Many stories have been written of the noble and mysterious nature of the cat. From palaces to barns they have been exalted in a frenzy of roles so that no wonder the conceit that you speak of and that Louise finds so unpleasant.

Of course, I will welcome Mr. Cat back but not without a good scolding and some punishment (no sardines for nine weeks). A limited bit of hunting here and there, just enough to keep the pantry free of mice. Crevices sealed and scrubbed will help, I'm sure. I have read stories about the dearness and smartness of mice and I am hoping they will continue being playful and helpful as they perform on the storybook stages of the little children who find them lovable, often dressed in little suits and dresses, holding canes and umbrellas, eating candies and solving problems for the storyteller.

And so, adieu for this day, Miss Blue. Please send another letter my way when you have some time.

Pearl, as I wait for Mr Cat.

Dearest Pearl,

The cat you gave us has completely taken over the house! Louise says it's just as well - the mice will soon be completely eradicated. But I will want to send him back to you as soon as his job here is done. He is so conceited!

Your Devoted Miss Blue

Yes, Miss Blue, times have been agonizing these past weeks. Nothing but misery abounding in the news. Frail minds are constantly being tested and worn to a frazzle by it all. St Petersburg can be a burden on the the more delicate senses, wouldn't you say? I, for one, find the least wrinkle in my life upsetting, as when, well, actually, just this very morning, I found that my recipe for Eggplant Caviar was missing from my favorite cookbook. I had a request from one of my neighbors here in the Village to bring it along to a gathering this evening celebrating the use of eggplant rather than fish in caviar. I have been selected to lead the parade, holding the Eggplant aloft, with the recipe made and offered to the many bystanders for their vote, good or bad. And now I am wondering what on earth to do! Eggs are in the news around here, Miss Blue, have you heard? Such a scandal! Any non-egg dish will be welcome on the menu.

Write again when you can, and I will do the same.

Love from Pearl and Schubert