sroth@muddcs.UUCP (Steve Roth) (12/03/85)
Dear Mother and Dad:
It has been three months since I left for college. I have been
remiss in writing and I am very sorry for my thoughtlessness in not having
written before. I will bring you up to date now, but before you read on,
please sit down. You are not to read any further unless you are sitting
down, okay?
Well then, I am getting along pretty well now. The skull fracture
and the concussion I got when I jumped out of the window of my dormitory
when it caught fire shortly after my arrival are pretty well healed by
now. I only spent two weeks in the hospital and now I can see almost
normally and only get those headaches once a day.
Fortunately, the fire in the dormitory and my jump was witnessed
by an attendant at the gas station near the dorm, who called the Fire
Dept. and the ambulance. He also visited me at the hospital and since I
had nowhere to live because of the burnt out dormitory, he was kind enough
to invite me to share his apartment with him. It's really a basement
room, but it's kind of cute. He is a very fine boy and we have fallen
deeply in love and are planning to get married. We haven't set the exact
date yet, but it will be before my pregnancy begins to show.
Yes, mother and dad, I am pregnant. I know how very much you are
looking forward to being grandparents and I know you will welcome the baby
and give it the same love and devotion and tender care you gave me when I
was a child. The reason for the delay in our marriage is that my
boyfriend has some minor infection which prevents us from passing our
premarital blood tests and I carelessly caught it from him. This will
soon clear up with the penicillin injections I am now taking daily.
I know you will welcome him into the family with open arms. He is
kind and although not well educated, he is ambitious. Although he is of a
different race and religion than ours, I know that your oft-expressed
tolerance will not permit you to be bothered by the fact that his skin
color is somewhat darker than ours. I am sure you will love him as I do.
His family background is good too, for I am told his father is an
important gunbearer in the village in Africa from which he comes.
Now that I have brought you up to date, I want to tell you there
was no dormitory fire; I did not have a concussion or a skull fracture; I
was not in the hospital; I am not pregnant; I am not engaged. I do not
have syphillis, and there is no Negro in my life. However, I am getting a
D in Sociology and an F in science, and I wanted you to see these marks in
the proper perspective.
Your loving daughter,
---- From "Work Hard and You Shall Be Rewarded" by Alan Dundes and
Carl R. Pagter. Happy holidays!
--
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Steve Roth Harvey Mudd College, Claremont California
ucbvax!trwrb!scgvaxd!muddcs!sroth -or- STEVE@YMIR.BITNET