The Christmas Letters (4 page)

The kids are fine, though Joe has gotten in a scrape or two, boys will be boys, I reckon. He is just crazy about a car, any car, and I must say that Bill aids and abets him in this pastime, having bought him three to date, which they are always “working on.” Joe is just as likely to be found
under
a car as driving it, and though I may complain about his dirty clothes and mediocre school reports, this is clearly his passion, and his talent.

I guess it will remain up to Mary to be my scholar, and in fact it looks as though she will be the Valedictorian of her class this June if she can keep her grades up. Or she may end up in a tie with Ernest Birdsong (a Brain). We are very proud of Mary who was awarded the Rotary Club Scholarship at a lovely Semi-formal Dinner in November,
to be applied toward the college of her choice. She has applied to several schools, all of them fairly near by, as Bill says he could not stand for her to go
too
far from home. Her first choice is the Woman’s College in Greensboro, but we hope she will go to Longwood which is also a teachers’ college, and closer to us. Mary says she is going to be an English teacher. She idolizes Mrs. Diane Hope, her senior English teacher, who graduated from W.C. herself. (This is the big appeal of Greensboro.)

Mary also takes after me in liking to cook, in fact she won the 4-H Cooking Contest last spring with her Carrot Cake recipe, and would have won the Regional except that she forgot to wear a hairnet at the competition, I think this is so silly.

I have always privately hoped that Mary would make the most of her God-given writing talent, for she has been writing poems and stories ever since she was a little child. No one in this neighborhood will ever forget
The Small Review,
Mary’s newspaper, which she wrote all by herself and then got Joe to help her copy out by hand, and sell it door to door. Some of the news items were so funny, such as “Miss Mary Pickett and Miss Ruthie Pickett were taken on a shopping trip to Raleigh by their mother, Mrs. William Pickett of 110 Maple Avenue. They bought new shoes at Buster Brown and enjoyed the opportunity to look at the
bones of their feet through a machine. Their bones are green.” How we all laughed at that! But I had to make Mary apologize to our neighbor across the street for her editorial, “Mr. George Maguire Is Too Grumpy.” And once when we had taken the children to the Outer Banks for a vacation, Bill found a beautiful Poem that Mary had written and then crumpled up and left in a dresser drawer, entitled “The Merry-Go-Round of Life.” It was just beautiful, and impossible to believe it had been written by a twelve-year-old girl, which Mary was at the time. Bill folded it up and put it in his billfold, he has carried it around ever since. Sometimes he will take it out and read it aloud to somebody, if the occasion arises, which just embarrasses Mary to death. You know how teenagers are! So, I harbor some hopes that my Mary will be a writer, but you may rest assured that we will be proud of her whatever she does.

And as for Ruthie, it is becoming clear that she might do just about anything. Bill has always said, “Ruthie is a firecracker!” This fall she was a J.V. Football Cheerleader, you ought to see her turning cartwheels out across the field. Now she is practicing for the Miss Elementary School Pageant, she is driving us all crazy by singing “I Enjoy Being a Girl” over and over, which will be her Talent. Since Mary and Joe were going to Myrtle Beach with the youth group from church last summer, I felt I should go as one of
the chaperones, which I did, and it was a lot of fun but No Vacation, I have to say.

Merry Christmas from all
the Picketts,

Mary, Joe, Ruthie, Birdie
and Bill

P.S. Here is Mary’s prize-winning recipe for Carrot Cake. Be sure to wear a hairnet (ha ha).

MARY’S CARROT CAKE

2 cups sifted flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1½ teas. baking soda

2 teas. cinnamon

1½ teas. salt

2 cups sugar

1 cup salad oil

4 eggs

2 cups finely grated carrots

1 8½ oz. can flaked coconut

½ c. chopped nuts

Preheat oven to 350°. Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon. Add sugar, oil, and eggs; beat well. Add carrots, nuts, and coconut; blend thoroughly. Pour into 3 9-inch round layer-cake pans that have been greased and floured. Bake in moderate oven 35 to 40 minutes. Remove from oven, cool a few minutes
in pans. Turn out on wire racks and cool thoroughly. Fill layers, and frost top and sides of cake with cream cheese frosting.

CREAM CHEESE FROSTING

½ cup butter

1 8-oz. package cream cheese

1 teas. vanilla

1 Ib. confectioner’s sugar

Combine butter, cream cheese, and vanilla; cream well. Beat sugar in, adding milk if necessary.

Dec. 24, 1966

Dearest Family,

I apologize for these carbon copies, I hope you can read them. Too bad Mary and Joe are all grown up now and can’t copy this letter out for me, as they did in their
Small Review,
so long ago. But I am in a hurry, and we have a
lot
of news.

Our lovely Mary is now Mrs. Sandy Copeland, having Eloped in a romantic trip to South Carolina in the dead of night. Sandy is a carpenter and such a nice young man, we love him like a son already. Sandy and Mary met in the
drugstore in Farmville, Virginia, where Mary was enrolled at Longwood College prior to her marriage. Naturally we were disappointed when she dropped out of school, but as Mary says, “Mom, I can finish school
anytime.”
Of course this is true. Bill and I are not too old to remember those early Days of Romance ourselves. After a very brief wedding trip (apparently it is easier to get married in South Carolina), they are living in Petersburg, Virginia, where Sandy works. Mary is not crazy about Petersburg, but she says she will be happy anywhere as long as she is with Sandy.

The other big news is, Joe is now in the Army serving Uncle Sam. We all went through much soul-searching before he left, I have to say. I will not even go into the endless discussions that took place night after night around our kitchen table after dinner, with Joe voicing all his objections to War in general and this War in particular, and Bill trying to tell him what is Right, and urging him not to make a decision that would ruin his life forever. This long discussion was cut short when Joe was drafted, and in the twinkling of an eye, he was gone. Now he is in Bien Hoa. I have worried and worried over it myself, and wish that the Lord would provide us with easier answers. Bill has put a big map of southeast Asia on the wall so he can see where Joe is at all times.

Speaking of Bill, his Health is still not too good though
he continues to go down to the store every day without fail, I don’t know what he would do with himself if this was not the case. He will be having some more tests at the University Hospital in early January, maybe they can find out what is wrong. As Bill says, his get-up-and-go has got up and went!

Speaking of get-up-and-go, Ruthie says she is going to major in Business when she goes to college, now who would ever have thought it? She was our light-hearted child. I will never forget that comedy routine she did at the March of Dimes benefit, dressed as a Bum.

In closing, I ask you to remember both Joe and Bill in your prayers, and ask God to bless our Country, and our boys in uniform.

Christmas Blessings from
Birdie and Bill

P.S. We are going to be
grandparents!
I can’t wait! I believe I am just as excited as Mary and Sandy are.

P.P.S. And even a sick man can’t resist:

BILL’S FAVORITE FUDGE

1 12-oz. package chocolate chips

4 c. miniature marshmallows

1 c. peanut butter

Melt peanut butter and chocolate chips over low heat until smooth. Gradually stir in marshmallows. Pour into 9-inch square pan and chill until firm. Cut into squares.

Dec. 18, 1967

To my dear Family,

I want to begin this Christmas letter by remembering Bill. You know that he died In Peace on August 10, at home, with me beside him, as I have been through Life. I woke up at the crack of dawn that morning, it was a Tuesday, filled with the strangest sense of deep peace yet a terrible urgency at the same time, and went immediately to his side.

I had been sleeping for months on a little rollaway cot right next to Bill’s hospital bed which we had put in the living room so everybody could visit him, you know how much he always loved company. Somehow I was not surprised to find Bill wide awake too, though he had been sleeping around the clock for several days.

“Hi there, Birdie honey,” he said, and I said, “Hi.” It was scarcely light, but I could see him well, his brown eyes as bright and lively as when we first met, all those years ago. He grinned at me like the young man he was back then,
a touch of the devil in him, and so I kissed his lips, and squeezed his hand, and sat there with him all day long while he slept as peaceful as a child until the late afternoon when he stirred a bit and then was gone, along with a little breeze that blew through the house just then like an angel passing.

At first I did not see how I could go on alone, but we have to, don’t we? We have to do what we have to do, and God will give us the Strength for it, as I have learned, bless His sweet name. And speaking of God, there is one more thing I want to say here and now, since many of you know how mad I used to get at Bill for not going to church. It is this. If there is a heaven, and I believe with all my heart that there is, then my Bill is right there, right now, even though I know he would rather be in the dime store. And I know I will be joining him by and by.

In the meantime, James Grady has taken over the dime store for me. Most of you know James who has worked for Bill since he was a high school boy, he has a Sterling Character. Though I had planned to retire from Birdie’s Lunch, nobody will have it, and so I have bowed to Popular Opinion and stayed on. James is putting in some booths, they will be real nice. It will look more like a real restaurant. Also I have a more modern menu now, including taco salads which are a big hit.

I have saved the best part for last.

I am so happy to announce the Birth of my adorable
grandson Andrew Bird Copeland, born June 10 in Rex Hospital, Raleigh, N.C., 7 lb. 8 oz. He came into this world with a full head of black hair to everyone’s amazement, you know Mary is so fair. But then the black hair fell out and Mary says it is coming back in blond now, and she further reports that the baby looks more and more like his daddy every day.

Little Andrew is
Just Perfect
in my opinion, of course I am not prejudiced at all!

And I’m just so glad he had a chance to meet Bill.

Joe got to come home for Bill’s funeral, he has lost 20 pounds and looks very handsome in his uniform, but he was all upset about his daddy of course, and about what is going on over there as well, though he did not want to talk about it. I guess Joe is just not cut out for war, and often I wonder if we made the right decision in urging him to go.