So my debut party was really the greatest success of the social season, because the second night of my debut party was the night when Willie Gwynn’s sister was having a dance at the Gwynn estate on Long Island, and Willie Gwynn said that all of the eligible gentlemen in New York were conspicuous by their absents at his sister’s party, because they were all at my party. So it seems as if I am really going to be quite a famous hostess if I can just bring my mind to the point of being Mrs. Henry Spoffard Jr.
Well Henry called up this morning and Henry said he had finally got his father’s mind so that he thought it was safe for me to meet him and he was coming up to get me this afternoon so that I can meet his family and see his famous old historical home at Pennsylvania. So then he asked about my debut party which some of the Philadelphia papers seemed to mention. But I told him that my debut was really not so much planned, as it was spontaneous, and I did not have the heart to call him up at a moments notice and take him away from his father at such a time for reasons which were nothing but social.
So now I am getting ready to visit Henry’s family and I feel as if my whole future depends on it. Because if I can not stand Henry’s family any more than I can stand Henry the whole thing will probly come to an end in the law court.
June 21st:
Well, I am now spending the weekend with Henry’s family at his old family mansion outside of Philadelphia, and I am beginning to think, after all, that there is something else in the world besides family. And I am beginning to think that family life is only fit for those who can stand it. For instants, they always seem to get up very early in Henry’s family. I mean it really is not so bad to get up early when there is something to get up early about, but when a girl gets up early and there is nothing to get up early about, it really begins to seem as if there was no sense to it.
So yesterday we all got up early and that was when I met all of Henry’s family, because Henry and I motored down to Pennsylvania and everybody was in bed when we arrived because it was after nine o’clock. So in the morning Henry’s mother came to my room to get me up in time for breakfast because Henry’s mother is very very fond of me, and she always wants to copy all of my gowns and she always loves to look through all of my things to see what I have got. So she found a box of liqueur candies that are full of liqueurs and she was really very delighted. So I finally got dressed and she threw the empty box away and I helped her downstairs to the Dining room.
So Henry was waiting in the dining room with his sister and that was when I met his sister. So it seems that Henry’s sister has never been the same since the war, because she never had on a man’s collar and a necktie until she drove an ambulants in the war, and now they cannot get her to take them off. Because ever since the armistice Henry’s sister seems to have the idea that regular womens clothes are effiminate. So Henry’s sister seems to think of nothing but either horses or automobiles and when she is not in a garage the only other place she is happy in is a stable. I mean she really pays very little attention to all of her family and she seems to pay less attention to Henry than anybody else because she seems to have the idea that Henry’s brains are not so viril. So then we all waited for Henry’s father to come in so that he could read the Bible out loud before breakfast.
So then something happened that really was a miracle. Because it seems that Henry’s father has practically lived in a wheel chair for months and months and his male nurse has to wheel him everywhere. So his male nurse wheeled him into the dining room in his wheel chair and then Henry said “Father, this is going to be your little daughter in law,” and Henry’s father took one good look at me and got right out of his wheel chair and walked! So then everybody was very very surprised, but Henry was not so surprised because Henry knows his father like a book. So then they all tried to calm his father down, and his father tried to read out of the Bible but he could hardly keep his mind on the Bible and he could hardly eat a bite because when a gentleman is as feeble as Henry’s father is, he cannot keep one eye on a girl and the other eye on his cereal and cream without coming to grief. So Henry finally became quite discouradged and he told his father he would have to get back to his room or he would have a relapse. So then the male nurse wheeled him back to his room and it really was pathetic because he cried like a baby. So I got to thinking over what Dorothy advised me about Henry’s father and I really got to thinking that if Henry’s father could only get away from everybody and have some time of his own, Dorothy’s advise might not be so bad after all.
So after breakfast we all got ready to go to church, but Henry’s sister does not go to church because Henry’s sister always likes to spend every Sunday in the garage taking their Ford farm truck apart and putting it back together again, and Henry
