5835 Vine Street Lincoln, Nebraska 68505
Dear Mark and Judy:

Bless your hearts — all three of them!

I have just been having an experience with my first love, an imagined experience, of course. I have been working on a chapter called "Playmates" and I told how I played with my first child before it was born. I think this has never been done in print before. I remember how Mona put my hand on her side and the baby kicked me. Then I tapped on his prison wall and, by golly, it kicked me again. I tell how we laughed about it. It makes a lovely memory.

I'll be waiting for news February 16.

Many thanks for your good birthday wishes. I am delighted with your gift of pens. They are certainly as good as tyo hey think they are. I used one of them in autographing my books and Myrtle has been using one ever since they arrived. She says, and I swear she's right, that they are perfectly magnoliant, which are a 75-cent word.

Now to the hearing aids. Golly how I do sympathize with that lady and her hearing experiences. I have two hearing aids because I thought I had lost one. I am using a Belo tone, which is probably the classic hearing aid at present. When I first used it I was much discouraged because it seemed to me that the hearing aid merely exaggerated the wacky sounds. The total effect was much by like a boiler factory, but I have kept on trying, and now I hear much better with it than without it, but not under all circumstances. It's certainly better than nothing and I us suggest that the lady keep on trying. She cannot expect to have much success in a considerable group of people. But when I am reasonably close to anyone I hear what is being said.

The chief purpose of this letter is to assure you that I love you very much, and when that baby is able to hear a message, assure it that I am its honorary grandpa for ever and ever.

Your old friend

Gaki
JGN:nh