Sunday at Midnight

[February 18, 1940]

Dearest little sweet Ava Helen:

I love you. I shall be happy when tomorrow is over and I am on my way home to you and our darling little children and our nice house. I don't like New York very well - the crowds of ugly, smelly, poorly-dressed people depress me, making me wonder if existence holds any attraction at all for the most of mankind - and yet most of them hold on. Perhaps their lot is not so unhappy as it seems to me it must be.

I like Heidelberger - he is a nice precise thin man, with gray white wavy hair. He is a good organic chemist and biochemist, at the Columbia medical school. His wife seems to be pleasant. He and Alfred and I carried on a spirited conversation about immunology throughout

[Printed at the bottom of the page in red ink:]

VISIT THE NEW YORK WORLD FAIR AND STAY AT THE COMMODORE

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dinner (turkey, mushrooms, salad, Graves wine, desert of some sort - I've forgotten) and on until 11 o'clock. I am excited about my ideas - which Heidelberger found interesting - perhaps I shall work on this a while now and write a paper, and perhaps talk at Berkeley and at Washington about it.

Alfred said that Landsteiner had asked him if it was all right for him to nominate me for the Nobel Prize, and had then done so. I said that now (in analogy to the Indian BS failed) I could write Nobel Lauriate failed in finals.

I am going to bed now, and I hope to sleep soon. Tomorrow come the Columbia visit, and then - homeward bound to my sweet little love, the wife of my bosom, the best mother of little babies in the world, the perfect companion, my own Ava Helen.

Love forever from your

Linus

Sunday, 5 PM.

Dearest little love:

I love you, sweetheart. I wish that a letter had come from you today. (Notice that I have fixed my little writing table here in my room so that it doesn't shake.) I shall see in the morning if one comes to Moe's office.

After writing to you last night I took a bath and read the paper (with funnies) and went to bed, but not to sleep for some time. Finally I went soundly asleep, and had a hard time getting up at 8 ³⁰ , having been awakened (by my order) by a phone call from the desk. I had a little breakfast and got to the meeting at 9 ³⁰ . (I also washed my hair this morning.) We had a long morning meeting, and then Moe too [sic] Aydelotte took Moe, Wilson, + me to lunch at the same club — I don't remember its name; it is at 7 W. 43 ^rd St. I have been reading another paper, and I shall now go to the Mirsky's for dinner. I think that I shall change to my blue suit, partially because my shoes are a little damp. There was a big storm just before I reached New York, and although most of the streets and sidewalks are clear there are still occasional patches of ice or slush.

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Moe said that we must save some time to see him and Mrs Moe in April, and that Mrs Moe had been greatly attracted to you and thought you were the sweetest thing that she had ever seen! I told him that you had liked Mrs M. very much. I know that we have all these good friends everywhere just because you are such a darling! I adore you, little love.

Many thanks for putting such a nice big darn in my wine-colored sock.

I told Wilson + Moe what Kisty had said about the Chemical Bond. Wilson said that he had never met Kisty* + he thought that Harvard had been stung in getting him. I said that Kisty is a good man. Then Wilson said that he had seen Bright occasionally + that he thought too well of himself. I said that he had done so when he left Princeton, but that we had taken it out of him; + Wilson said that Harvard with its Society of Fellows has spoiled our good work, he was afraid.

We had a good lunch dinner [lunch is written above dinner] — oysters, tenderloin steak with vegebos, white burgundy, cheese (smachino, or something like that), + coffee.

I wish that I could start home now. Next time I'm going to start home right after the meeting. Perhaps I can catch a streamliner and get home soon — say Tuesday night!

Loads of love and kisses from your

own

Linus

*His office is 4 miles from

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