Much love Darling, I hope things are getting settled and more peaceful—
XO
Scott’s Cove
Darien, Conn.
June 1st, 1967†
Mr. and Mrs. Lindbergh regret that, because of the absence of Mr. Lindbergh from the country and Mrs. Lindbergh’s lack of knowledge of the date of his return or where to reach him, they are unable to accept the very kind invitation of President and Mrs. Johnson for dinner Monday evening, June 12th.
Les Monts-de-Corsier
September 12th, 1967
Dear Mina [Curtiss],
It was so good to get your rich letter. It is interesting how much richer letters from writers are. They are somehow three-dimensional as compared to usual flat one-dimensional ones, even from people one loves, who are not writers.
I have felt very cut off from people this summer. Partly it was just the flu–sinus–ear episode in August, which wasn’t that painful but left me almost totally deaf for three weeks. (I only have one good ear and that was the one affected.) It was especially frustrating because Scott was here for ten days of that time, going through quite a crisis on the draft problem, and I had such difficulty hearing what he was saying. It is interesting how much one counts on the little asides, or the drop in voice—the hesitations and mumbled words. These are the important clues to communication.
CAL was here part of this time too, and it was rather an intense week. I don’t know yet what Scott will do. He feels very much opposed to the war in Vietnam and, after eight years abroad, really more European than American. Also, he feels behind in his getting into a career and would like to go on into animal psychology and behaviorism. His deferment has been cancelled and he will certainly not get another deferment for graduate work in a new field.
Charles was very concerned about it, and I also (for somewhat different reasons), but there was very little we could do except listen (and I could hardly do that!) and, in Charles’s case, point out the dangers in jumping too fast into a solution that might not turn out to be satisfactory in the long run.
I am glad you are going off on a trip. Even if one works (I have worked quite steadily all summer except for the week in bed), one gets so bogged down and ingrown on a writer’s routine, particularly in bad weather. I am going off for two days next week with Helen Wolff to see Basel and some paintings Kurt loved. It will be good to get away. I have decided that I have become rather bored with Switzerland. I miss my sharp-tongued old lady friend who died last fall, whom I used to see once a week. I remember Amey saying (in her eighties), “Switzerland is all right for a month or two, but then you get so bored you want to go out and get drunk!” There hasn’t been anyone around I could get “drunk” with, and anyway, I felt so flattened out by August that I couldn’t do much.
It has been beautiful weather, however, and I had a lovely visit from Anne and the baby in July and hope for another short one before I go home (the first week in October). Now autumn has fallen quite swiftly. Foggy mornings, overcast skies, cold nights, and the wet meadows dotted with lavender autumn crocuses.
I think of you a good deal, often at that hour between tea and supper when one minds most being alone. (In July I used to walk then, but now it is too dark.) It’s particularly hard if one can’t have a glass of sherry. Grapefruit juice is a poor substitute.
CAL had a letter from a friend in the U.S. that must express what you (and I—so many of us) feel about this summer: “It’s been a depressing summer, and I begin to think that something must be done soon about Vietnam to keep American society from becoming unhinged by self-doubt and worse, self-hate.”
Much love, Mina. Your letter was a great joy and it will be wonderful to be talking to you soon.
Anne
Les Monts-de-Corsier
Wednesday, September 13th, 1967
Dear Pixie,*
I find myself unable to stop thinking about you and your painful predicament. I keep wishing I could have said more to help you, the afternoon you and Eglantine† were here for tea, in the ordeal you face those next days in your interview with your husband. I have finally decided to put down some of these after-thoughts that should have been said more clearly, that I would say now if you were here another afternoon. Think of it as a continued conversation:
No matter what he says—much of it may sound reasonable—he cannot answer for how you feel. If you neither love nor respect him, you cannot carry through a marriage successfully. It would be acting out a lie, which would be the worst possible thing for your children, for yourself, and even for him. A relationship that is wrong for one person is wrong for both. A marriage founded on a lie is immoral and will fail.
The marriage vows, in such a case, are only the dead letter of the law and not true to its spirit. I think it is barbaric to be bound by them. To live a lie will be destructive to you, to him, but chiefly to the children. It has been demonstrated by psychological studies that the worst thing for children is to be told one thing and to feel the opposite is true. Children feel the lie and the pretense, even if it is unspoken. Many doctors feel this is a frequent cause of schizophrenia: children cannot deal with the two surfaces. It puts an impossible burden on them. The argument of “self-sacrifice,” and “Christian charity,” etc. falls flat before the rock of integrity and honesty.
The argument that your children need a father, a man: yes, but they don’t need a man they don’t respect and whom you don’t respect. They will respect him more if he breaks loose and makes a new life on his own. It is his only chance of winning their respect.
Actually, I think you can and do feel Christian charity. It is not inconsistent. You feel sorry for him; you would like to help him; you believe he can start a new life on his own, free of you and the children; you would like to make it easier for him. If he does not fight the case, you need not bring up all the horrible details that you have against him. You prefer to bury them and will only expose them if forced to it.
Don’t try to argue with him (the arguments I put here are only to strengthen you). He is desperate and will use any weapon to try to break you down, but this should only strengthen your resolve to leave him. If you can do nothing else, just try to remain there as quietly as possible, listening to him and saying only something, in your own words, like: “I am terribly sorry, but this is the way I feel and nothing you say can make me feel any differently.”
Don’t be afraid. He really cannot hurt you. He has hurt you, of course, but it is all in the past. You are now stronger than he.
It is only the memories of the past that undermine you—the memories of being afraid and of being hurt. And your false sense of guilt and your false sense of good manners. (Having been brought up not to hurt anyone, to want to please people and be nice—I know it only too well; I was brought up the same way.)
Remember you are doing this for the children more than for yourself. It is not right to sacrifice their lives for him. Your freedom from him is their only chance of healthy survival.
Forgive this outburst, but I had to write it. I will be thinking of you. I am sure you can, and will, carry it through as you have the earlier ordeals, and your son will certainly be a great moral support by your side.
You might surprise yourself by waking up to find how very strong you have become. Other people know it; it is only you who don’t see it.
With my love and my very real faith in you—
Anne
Cuckoo Clock*
Sunday a.m., September 17th, 1967
Dear Scott,
This is the first time we have seen the sun here for at least two weeks. Ernestine and John Chamberlain† are here, came late last night from Vichy where John attended a conference of economists. John is now typing on the balcony, and Ernestine writing in the “baby’s” room at the card table.
We had a long late breakfast sitting over the counter. I wish you could have been here to hear some of John’s reflections on the state of the world. One thing he said interested me very
much. He wrote a piece (published last year), written in the Beirut airport appropriately, where he said he had a sudden view of U.S. policy and the war in Vietnam as not a struggle for democracy, the Free World, our friends, etc., but simply to maintain control of airports all over the world, much as England fought to keep her seaports open. Air power is what ultimately matters; as long as we can maintain bases, so his thesis runs, we don’t care too much about the politics of the country (e.g. Spain).
He thinks Johnson is trying very hard to end the war before the election, and that if the Republicans get in, they will press to “win or get out” as quickly as possible so that the Vietnam struggle might fold up rather quickly. There will probably be others, of course (to maintain our bases around the world?). He also said there was considerable pressure from responsible sources to end the draft entirely and maintain a voluntary army (and professionals). This would be more efficient for the Army and for the country, too, economically. As it is now, it is very wasteful of man-power and the potentialities of the men concerned. I keep feeling, in the light of this constantly shifting picture, that it is too bad for you to jump too quickly into nationality before you have had a chance to try out your new work life, etc., and know exactly where these are going to lead you. (Perhaps you feel you do know?)
And I keep remembering your saying once that you’d prefer to be an “exiled American.” If you really still would, perhaps that is what you should be. (Your father would probably not agree.) My feeling is that whatever you do now (unless you go home), you are going to get bad publicity about draft evasion, even if you announce you are changing your citizenship. And changing one’s citizenship is not like marriage, where you can get a divorce if it’s a mistake, or like divorce, where if you feel that’s a mistake you can get remarried. It’s pretty irrevocable.
True (if you remain in exile), you run the risk of arrest (if you go home), losing your freedom to travel, and possibly restrictions on your income (your lawyer or banker could advise you on this).
And I would think you would have time to write your draft board something, telling them their notice was delayed, as it unfortunately was. Perhaps just how you feel about the war in Vietnam. In other words, taking a position as a conscientious objector (on the grounds of this war). This would be an honest course and there are plenty of people like you.
And of course you can change your citizenship later, if and when you know exactly where your work will lead you and where you really feel you could live.
It seems to me that so often in your life you choose the hard way. What you are choosing now is infinitely more difficult than going home and getting into the Coast Guard or the Navy, say. But in the past you have shown that once you choose “the hard way,” you have the guts and the persistence to follow it through successfully so I have faith in your being able to do it here.
I would like you to be free in your opportunities and in yourself—to really get ahead in the work you have chosen. It is a wonderful field and you can do a great deal in it. It will be good to be working on a “terrestrial plane” and not on just a political one. More seems to be able to be done here than in the human political one.
Much love Scott, and have a good trip to Ireland—
Mother
6:30 a.m., Monday, January 15th, 1968
Dearest Ansy,
I have been home a week but still wake at 5:30 or six—still, that is an improvement on two or three—and the first week, which is always difficult, is over. I have been through the accumulated mail, bills, and telephone calls (but not the Xmas cards). Your father was here for just three days, very busy ones: one in town, and the others spent on mail, telephone calls, files and lists. He is now back in England on Wildlife meetings.*
There is quite a lot of talk, confusion, and resentment here as a result of the President’s recommended travel restrictions (“to the Western Hemisphere” was what he said, and that meant the Americas: Canada, Mexico).† Apparently Mrs. Johnson made an impassioned radio plea to American women not to travel to Europe for two years. And they are talking of taxing airfares or travelers six dollars each day they are abroad. Congress reconvenes today and there will be stiff fights over it. The travel industry is so enormous in this country that if it is slashed it may have some effect on the national economy. Also, people resent travel restrictions. There are many rumors: that travelers will be limited in the amount of money they can take out, as in England; that private investment abroad will be restricted; that this is the start of a controlled economy, etc.
Your father feels that your position will not be affected—or will be the last to be affected. And some suggestions are that people with relatives abroad have some laxity in travel. I hope so! Anyway it’s too early to tell what will be hammered out. It is a world I do not understand very well.
I must now turn on television since Mrs. Swanson‡ has told me Jon will be on some program between seven and nine this morning. I doubt if I can look at it that long, but at least I’ll turn it on. It has been terribly cold this week, so cold that you put a scarf over your face when you went out. It was hard to breathe, snow everywhere, and the cove was frozen over. It looked arctic, with ice pushed up in frozen chunks and waves.
Jon has been on my TV, talking on the resources of the seas and the dwindling whale population. He talks very well, slowly, with quite a western accent (surprisingly!), and smiling quite naturally—using his hands somewhat squarely, if you know what I mean. I guess it’s over. It is now 7:25.
It is now after breakfast and bath, and I am going out to the Little House. The snow has melted some, but it is hard and icy and branches are down everywhere. Last night it blew and banged, and snow kept sliding off the roof with a roar that made Brenna bark angrily and made me nervous.
You communicate so marvelously that I get the quality of your daily life much better than I could hope. (That doesn’t mean you have to write me immediately!)
There was such joy in seeing your gay happy baby. I think of the sheer joy of that beautiful walk, dragging Charles Feydy on his tiny sled through the lacy-with-snow beech forest, pink cheeks under his blue bonnet. Do take care of yourself and keep up the writing and the hours off. Reeve and Richard* will be here next week after exams. I will write again.
XO—XO
Mother
Scott’s Cove, Darien
Sunday, March 3rd, 1968
Dearest Ansy,
Your letter from the Dordogne was a joy and was here waiting for me Thursday night when your father and I drove back from town in a wet blanketing snowstorm. (The windshield got packed with slush and the VW slithered in ruts made by trucks.) It was lovely to think of you in “light sweater” weather with “almost sun-bathing sun” and violets (plucked off at the head by Charles), primroses, and dandelions. Is Charles really offering you violet heads? How grown up he sounds. I loved the description of him in the plane. One wonders what he really saw out of the window, and how he translated it in his mind. Will he remember and tell you someday?
I am glad you are writing again, and your illustrations are delicious. A good idea for a book (remember St.-Ex.’s illustrations for his Le Petit Prince?).
Your father asks, each time he comes back from Washington or each time he sees a letter in the mail, “Any news of Scott?” Reeve says the present draft regulations are actually better, since more individual choice is left up to the local boards. It seems that Richard will be allowed to teach as “essential to the community.” But elsewhere you hear great criticism from the graduate schools, which will have almost no able-bodied male students next year.
Reeve is very anxious to have you and Julien and the baby for her wedding on the ranch. She is not having anyone except immediate (grown-up) family. No aunts and uncles or children, except for Erin and Peter who are there. So Charles would not be overcome with relatives. Only Richard’s immediate family will come, and they will probably live at “The Homestead,” entirely self-sufficient. Life on the ranch is somehow eas
y and not regimented and everyone goes his own way. Very simple.
Your father is very busy with his many lives: down to Washington for work and the Naval hospital, World Wildlife activities, Pan Am meetings and, in between, seeing people who are writing books about various aviation personalities or companies. This last can be taxing. We had eight people for supper last week on two such books. Mrs. Swanson and I had planned chicken and peas, when two of the guests telephoned me: “We can eat anything but meat and fish”! What else is there, I thought wildly? We added macaroni and cheese to the dinner. We’re still eating up the chicken. (They were Seventh Day Adventists—I dimly remember that Scott was ill in one of their hospitals in the Middle East, and had vegetarian meatloaf and chips to eat.)
I must go back to heat up that chicken for Sunday lunch. Do stay well and go on writing.
XOXOXO
Mother
Monday a.m. before breakfast
Everyone left me at the same moment yesterday after tea. It is hard to be left alone—not so hard to live alone, once one adjusts. I wonder how your days without Julien, alone at Les Rieux, went? Dogs do help tremendously—also it is easier to be alone in a smaller house. One feels snugger. Bigger houses are full of noises and empty spaces, vacuums into which rush one’s nostalgia and apprehension.
The newspapers are also loaded with bad news: the war, the predictions of more serious trouble in race relations here. Your father is very gloomy on this situation (and the state of the world in general). He argues with Reeve (Richard is not an arguer). Reeve says: “Throw me no exponential curves.”* I feel, when we get into the argument, that we’re going through the washer, no cycle can be omitted and they’re irreversible and grind on.
Against Wind and Tide: Letters and Journals, 1947-1986 Page 29
