There are lots of troubles in the world!
17th May
Dear Daddy-Long-Legs,
This is going to be extremely short because my shoulder aches at the sight of a pen.
Lecture notes all day, immortal novel all evening, make too much writing.
Commencement three weeks from next Wednesday.
I think you might come and make my acquaintance—I shall hate you if you don't!
Julia's inviting Master Jervie, he being her family, and Sallie's inviting Jimmie McB., he being her family, but who is there for me to invite?
Just you and Lippett, and I don't want her.
Please come.
Yours, with love and writer's cramp.
Judy
LOCK WILLOW, 19th June
Dear Daddy-Long-Legs,
I'm educated!
My diploma is in the bottom bureau drawer with my two best dresses.
Commencement was as usual, with a few showers at vital moments.
Thank you for your rosebuds.
They were lovely.
Master Jervie and Master Jimmie both gave me roses, too, but I left theirs in the bath tub and carried yours in the class procession.
Here I am at Lock Willow for the summer—for ever maybe.
The board is cheap; the surroundings quiet and conducive to a literary life.
What more does a struggling author wish?
I am mad about my book.
I think of it every waking moment, and dream of it at night.
All I want is peace and quiet and lots of time to work (interspersed with nourishing meals).
Master Jervie is coming up for a week or so in August, and Jimmie McBride is going to drop in sometime through the summer.
He's connected with a bond house now, and goes about the country selling bonds to banks.
He's going to combine the 'Farmers' National' at the Corners and me on the same trip.
You see that Lock Willow isn't entirely lacking in society.
I'd be expecting to have you come motoring through—only I know now that that is hopeless.
When you wouldn't come to my commencement, I tore you from my heart and buried you for ever.
Judy Abbott, A.B.
24th July
Dearest Daddy-Long-Legs,
Isn't it fun to work—or don't you ever do it?
It's especially fun when your kind of work is the thing you'd rather do more than anything else in the world.
I've been writing as fast as my pen would go every day this summer, and my only quarrel with life is that the days aren't long enough to write all the beautiful and valuable and entertaining thoughts I'm thinking.
I've finished the second draft of my book and am going to begin the third tomorrow morning at half-past seven.
It's the sweetest book you ever saw—it is, truly.
I think of nothing else.
I can barely wait in the morning to dress and eat before beginning; then I write and write and write till suddenly I'm so tired that I'm limp all over.
Then I go out with Colin (the new sheep dog) and romp through the fields and get a fresh supply of ideas for the next day.
It's the most beautiful book you ever saw—Oh, pardon—I said that before.
You don't think me conceited, do you, Daddy dear?
I'm not, really, only just now I'm in the enthusiastic stage.
Maybe later on I'll get cold and critical and sniffy.
No, I'm sure I won't!
This time I've written a real book.
Just wait till you see it.