All of this is justified, so read it as soon as circumstances permit. Scanning it to begin with will reveal the topics -
Thursday evening
October 29, 1964
Dear Patricia:
As usual, I much enjoyed the pleasure of your companionship at dinner at Paola’s last evening. The steak wasn’t up to standard and I’ve a mind to tell the management and why - at least if I’m tempted to order a steak there again. The filet mignon doubtless would have been better and if it had as high a percentage of fat as our New York (?) cuts (They didn’t seem good enough to be New York cuts) we’d have needed their suppose 16 oz. to get the right amount of meat. A good prime rib roast would doubtless have been much better than our New York cuts.
The reason I asked if you would wear your hair down & wear the dangle earrings next week (Fri. Oct 6), when we go to my niece & nephews, is simply that I think you are your loveliest that way. On the other hand, if you want to appear more nearly your age by putting your hair up, it will be fine with me. In any case Barbara & Woodrow Williams will not have had a more beautiful guest at any time.
I think you’ll find them quite acceptable company, though a bit more formal than some you know, as both were raised more formally. They have been mellowing a good deal since they were married, in spite of their responsibilities with two children and a third one on the way. Whether they’ll ever become as casual as you (and I) am accustomed to being, remains to be seen but lots of good people never attain that state. It calls for a measure of independence in thinking that most do no attain and also a somewhat broader sense of humor.
[page 2] Incidentally, recalling your need occasionally for an I.D. card brings to mind the fact that Amadou Bandé told me today of a solution to the problem. He didn’t know he was doing so as he was talking about himself. You weren’t mentioned, and it would have been impertinent on my part had I done so. I encountered him sitting on a bench looking over an examination folder he had gotten for an exam in his cultural anthropology course - in which he has a test tomorrow. I decided to talk with him a few minutes for this is what he & the Guinea boys want in order to gain proficiency in English. I told him I’d bring the big atlas (that I loaned you) for our next conference this coming Tuesday A.M. so he could tell me more - in a meaningful way - about life in Upper Volta. He mentioned the scars on his face again & said that, during the years of the French protectorate (close of World War I to 1960 when Upper Volta go its freedom,) the tribal marks (scars) on the Upper Voltans served as their I.D. cards. Wherever one of them went in the country, there was no mistaking his tribe for he always had his I.D. card on his face. Being Muslims they had no problem of buying cocktails, but it was important to know their tribe and that, they couldn’t conceal. The practice of scarring the faces is beginning to lose out but he said it still is being followed largely because of the weight of tradition.
I’ve tried since to conjure up in my mind a scar pattern that would serve your I.D card needs but I seem to be short on imagination. If you want that kind of an I.D. testimonial, perhaps you’ll have to figure it out yourself. Personally, I like you the way you are & wouldn’t have you changed for the world!
[page 3] I’ve been thinking a lot about your idea of applying for status as a Playboy Bunny and somehow I think there should be a better way to accomplish you goal. I know that it is the salary (& tips no doubt) that you are toying with, but I can’t escape the feeling that, if you are to accomplish anything in the dramatic world, being a Playboy Bunny would lessen your opportunities. I keep thinking of my brother, ted, the music arranger turned inventor who also gave a lot of thought to ways of earning a lot of money as quickly as possible. He too couldn’t escape the realization of the imposition of poverty which has been too much your mother’s lot in recent years - and which has worried you a good deal.
Ted tried several things he thought might be short cuts to wealth or at least financial ease that would make it possible for him then to devote himself to his beloved music. He (with a friend) tried general contracting which, in the late twenties and thirties called only for imagination and nerve, with both of which he was liberally supplied. However, jobs - contracts - didn’t come as easily as he had hoped so his bank roll didn’t grow very rapidly. Then he transferred from S.J. State to Stanford & began a career in law. He was sharp enough but the things a lawyer has to do bothered his conscience and cramped his style as an independent thinker. He’d have had to regiment himself unless he was willing to become an unscrupulous lawyer - and he couldn’t stomach that.
Then, he decided to put all his efforts into building a superior [page 4] dance band. He was an excellent performer on the saxophone & clarinet and he played a variety of other instruments. He was immediately successful & soon had a notable dance band with all the work he could do. His banjo player has since become one of the Peninsula’s expert nose & throat physicians. Another band member ultimately became the principal & controlling owner of the Pet Milk Co. and a millionaire. Ted, however, wanted to study harmony & musical composition & music arranging & this was difficult for a dance band leader, even if he did take trips around the world.
Eventually, Ted concluded what some of his friends had known all along that since his talent lay in serious music - the mastery of musical composition & structure, musical theory and style, harmony, etc. - that the shortest route to success lay in giving his music all he had. So he came back and in several institutions studied the musical fields in which he was interested and in a few years was known as one of the outstanding musical specialists in the West. He rose rapidly and so did his earnings. NBC in San Francisco, then Horace Heidt, then NBC again in Chicago, New York & Los Angeles in that sequence and finally MGM for whom he arranged most of the music for Esther Williams outstanding movies, also Bing Crosby, John Scott Trotter’s Orchestra & many more. Only his deafness that developed in the late forties put an end to his rise. I’m sure he’d say - “Don’t waste time on attempted short cuts. Put your effort where your talents lie. The results will follow.”
As a Playboy Bunny you’d without doubt be a complete success. [page 5] However, your personal appeal to me is so great that, in spite of all the protection the Playboy restaurants or Clubs can give you - and I’m sure that they do as much as they can for their “Bunnies” - I’m positive that you’d be hounded by a continual stream of Tom Kelly types (moneyed ones, of course) who’d subject you to every kind of pressure they know to get you to compromise your principles, your standards of behavior and your ambitions for intellectual development. To the extent that you succumbed to blandishments (at a price - They’d spend money on you & then let you know that they considered, therefore, that they’d bought and were entitled to your submission) you’d be dragged or driven farther & farther from you dramatic goals - where you talent lies until after a few years, you chances of even getting into fields you love would largely evaporate. I’m talking only in terms of what I know from observation & what I’ve been able to hear first hand of what the moneyed typed of Playboys expect and how little generally they car for the consequences in the lives of those (the girls) to whom they look for satisfaction of their pleasures. Then, too, I’m sure your success would be obvious enough to inspire the jealousy of other “Bunnies” who would not have the dramatic talents you possess.
I’m seriously concerned, “my darling daughter” that initial success in any direction you turn might lead you to think you could handle any type of situation that might develop - but form the “rats” I’ve known with money and polished manners, but without scruples, [page 6] I’m sure you could not bring it to pass. At 24 opportunity beckons to you. At 30, probably tired by the pace you could not avoid, opportunity would be waving you goodbye. In your field of talent, success can come to you, though with a somewhat lower pay check by the time you’d be thinking of turning away from the Playboy satisfactions - in every area of your interest would be a hundred fold greater.
Incidentally, your idea of an epic poem on insects for your second term paper intrigued me so much that last night I wrote out as fast as I could drive my pencil the outlines of one theme for such an epic, one that has never been done but for which the time surely is ripe. If it appeals to you - and I’ve had it typed today and will give you a copy tomorrow (Friday) at class, - and with a list of insects from which to choose a “Dramatis Personae” you could, I’m sure do a worthwhile term paper. Later, on a more ambitious level, if you would consider collaborating with me, you to furnish the imagination, drama & poetic insight, I to supply the factual data and the continuity, the “Epic” might well meet with favor at the hands of a publisher. It would take the two of us for I don’t believe either of us could provide the entire spectrum of requirement. Anyway, I can tell you more about the theme, you can do a term paper in any case, and we can talk about a publishable sequel.
I spoke to Dr. Richter, our veterinarian professor, about altering the kittens (Twischen or Zwishcen - now is positively beautiful) & he can arrange to do it next Thursday. I’ll see your mom for arrangements.
Now I must quit or you’ll balk at reading anything more that I write.
Love Carl
Dr. Carl Duncan and Patricia Whiting Collection (SJSU)
