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Dear Tomei,

Thank you for your quick response. I was unsure if my letter would reach you in these troubling times. I am glad it has. And, I must confess, it took some time for me to write you back. It’s hard out here in the uncharted west. It’s hard to get comfortable and even harder to know if comfort is earned. I try not to think about it. Money comes in and money comes out and the boys spend it like there’s no home waiting for them. I try not to think about it. When they go out, I stay in and nurse my tired lungs and narrow feet. What a strange position for someone like myself, someone who grew up under bright blue skies in the lazy east.

I fear I’m getting away from your response.

It’s been good to know you’re well. I saw a man beat his dog to submission in a dry field. I try not to look at the young men shooting house sparrows where they nest. It seems violence is in us on a level I was not aware. You were always a good man and in these dark nights and creaking mornings, I long to hear your footsteps on cold tile. Many days I wonder how I got here and if my garden back home is still being cared for by Miss Jeanette.

Do you remember seeing drunks falling apart in falling snow? It was last winter in Raleigh and you kept stopping our walk to set them on their feet. When the captain says it might snow and the sky looks forlorn and angry, I think about you and the fireplace in your father’s farmhouse, the one where my old coat is still drying.

Mostly, Tomei, I try not to think at all. It feels like someone has boarded up all the windows inside me and the radio has been shot and the books have all been shredded. My father and his father and all my blood served. I wonder if a barracks is my home or if it’s somewhere else I belong. I wonder a lot. It seems all I do is wonder nowadays. Ken, Cliff, Ray, Gina, Webster and the rest all made it out okay. Okay seems worse and worse as time keeps rolling.

Hope to see you soon. Hope I can show you something new in the west.

X