11/14/44 V-Mail
Italy
Hey:
What do you mean—did I ever ask to go home. You act like you thought I didn’t want to.
Honey, let’s get it all straight. In spite of the horseshit you hear back there, roughly 1% of the people here go home per month. There are three ways of going home other than in a combat unit on 30 day leave:
- Incompetent professionally
- Incompetent physically or psychologically
- Return for a specific mission
So long as I see kids walking around from 5th Army with 5 of the new service bars, I can’t feel very sorry for myself. #3 is the answer and I’m naturally keeping my eyes open.
I am sending off the Christmas box tomorrow. I till be in two installments. One contains 13 pieces and is for you. The other has a silk and a wool scarf for Nena & Mother, and also a blue gadget for you.
Merry Christmas. Love Cy