479 4/9/1943 Helen Carlson to Sadie Erwin

Helen Carlson 401 Alexander, Monroe, Louisiana Friday, April 09, 1943

Sadie Erwin 1120 Cole St., Enumclaw, Washington

Dear Folks, I just wrote a long letter to Jim and will write to you now. Jimmie’s pictures came yesterday and I just love them. I told you before they came I just remembered but they are awfully good I think and tomorrow I am going to get the frames and mail them. I’ll send you one and send one more and Glad and Stella can decide which one has it and then I’m trying to get a real good snapshot of him to have enlarged and will get a frame for that and mail it. I have some ready to be developed now and hope there is an especially good one in the roll. I am so sorry I didn’t have more pictures made of him but I wasn’t especially pleased with the proofs but the pictures turned out so much better. I feel especially bad because it looks as though I’m too tight to buy enough pictures for the family but I really did plan the three for all of you not remembering Elmer’s folks and I do have to send them one. I wouldn’t want Jim’s wife to neglect you folks so I’m always deciding I’m going to write to Elmer’s folks more often but then Florence will make me mad and I won’t write for a while or something. I had a nice letter from you today with two of Jimmie’s letters enclosed. What was the tuft between Harold and Bus Oliver. Did the speedometer cable on the car break and what long walk is it you have to take now Pop. It sounded as though the parking lot had been changed so you had to walk much farther. How far is it you have to walk. I hope Cully will find a job right away so he won’t have to go into the army. Elmer is going to take his draft card to work tomorrow and show it to them and we’re hoping that they will fix it up so he will get into that other classification which is men with children engaged in war work. How is the baby getting along on the cow’s milk. I hope she gets adjusted to her new life pretty soon. This afternoon Sarah and I stopped over to see Jane who had just come home from the hospital with her new baby and it was crying real hard too. Today Annie came to work again and made Jimmie a batch of brownies but was quite puzzled about them because she didn’t know what brownies were. I explained that they were kind of like a cookie and kind of like cake and gave her a recipe but she didn’t know what she was baking anyway and they didn’t turn out quite as good as ones I have made but I’m going to send them anyway and will be something swell to eat and they are good anyway. Annie sure is swell. Today she asked me if I sent my laundry to the regular laundry and I said I did. She said after this she would do it all for me for 50 cents extra and here I spend two dollars a week at the regular laundry. She said just buy her a little scrub board and she’ll do absolutely everything. She said I seemed to be afraid of asking her to do anything so she had to think up things for me. I do hate to ask her to do things like that because it seems like she works so hard for a little money but that’s her price and is all she wants. As long as Jimmie knows I’m near by he just follows Annie all over but if he thought for a minute he was alone with her he would put up an awful fuss. Today Jimmie pulled his diapers off and threw them in the toilet. Tomorrow I’m going to buy him a few training pants and see how that works. Someone said that diapers make them want to wet more and I am so anxious to get him trained that I thought I would try the training pants anyway. I had that nice letter from Stella yesterday and she sure does write good letters when she writes. Annie is married and has two sons in the army, one is out of the country. She seems like a nice clean, respectable Negro and I hope she will work for me all summer. Everyone says you have to be tough with them but I just can’t treat her any differently than I would a white woman and I’m sure if you treat them right they will treat you right. If she wants to quit because I’m too nice to her I would rather have it that way than having her quit because I was too mean. Twice she couldn’t come but she called me up and explained why and then came the next day instead so she has been dependable. She doesn’t eat a thing here at all. I always tell her to fix herself something to eat but she always says she isn’t hungry but will stop on the way home and buy a coke and eat when she gets home. If I happen to have any cokes I let her have one. The first day she came she asked me if she could smoke and I said I guessed it would be alright. I thought she would anyway if I wasn’t around and as long as she wasn’t having to take care of Jimmie it didn’t seem to make much difference. She has a cigarette in her mouth almost all the time and smokes it like a pipe. She never touches it after putting it in her mouth but just puffs on it until it is down so short it looks like it must burn her. One thing I am glad for is we have a toilet in the garage so she doesn’t have to use our bathroom but maybe she does anyway when I’m gone. She really is a good woman though to have. This morning Jimmie and I went to a coke party. There were ten of us and four of us brought our children who were all just about the same age. Three of them were boys and they wouldn’t pay any attention to the little girl at all but just about wrecked this girl’s house. They wore us out running after them so we were glad to leave and come home. Jimmie still doesn’t walk but I sure hope he will by a week from Sunday because that is his birthday. He stands up all alone all the time but just won’t walk. Yesterday there were about five kids playing out in the yard and Jimmie wanted to go out so bad that I put him out and could watch him through the kitchen window while I was getting supper. I gave Jimmie and all the kids a cracker and they all sat around in a circle and Jimmie was sitting in the circle too having the best time but it looked so funny to see him sitting with the bigger kids. They are all so good to him and always come over and want him to come out. It is so hard to change him now or put him on the toilet because he doesn’t want to be taken away from the other children at all and kicks and screams and acts just terrible when I pick him up to bring him in. Gosh Folks, I didn’t realize it was so late but is ten thirty so I better quit and go to bed. I think I’ll hurry and take a shower first. It is nice having a shower because it doesn’t take so long and then I don’t have to wash the tub out afterwards. I’m still going to get that tea sent to you soon too. With Love, Helen