So, off I dashed to the train depot to buy a ticket to Dalhart, Texas, only to be informed the closest destination I could reach was Amarillo. Later I found out that the train I took did, indeed, go through Dalhart. Anyway, I quickly wrote a letter to Walter telling him that I would get off the train in Amarillo, (80 miles from Dalhart) and if he wasn't there to meet me I would go to the largest hotel and wait for him there. I sent the letter special delivery, which turned out to be a huge mistake, as it must have sat in the Dalhart post office for days, waiting for someone to get around to making that delivery out the the airbase. So, when I wasn't met at the depot I looked in the phone book and chose the Amarillo Hotel since it was the first one listed and I thought Walter would start with that one if he tried to locate me. Three days later, after sitting in that room, afraid to budge, I received the call I'd been waiting for. Walter had finally gotten my letter, so had planted himself in a pay phone booth, told the operator his story; that his wife was in a hotel in Amarillo, but he didn't know which one. There were 35 hotels in the town and the operator started calling each one, and started at the bottom of the list! It was about 8 p.m. when she reached me, and Walter had been in the phone booth for a long while feeding the pay phone. He told me there was a bus leaving for Dalhart at 9 o'clock that night, but I elected to wait until morning, so he said he'd have one of his friend's wife meet me and take me to our new abode, since he'd be flying when I arrived. Sure enough, as I stepped out of the bus a young woman walked up to me, introduced herself and took me in tow. When we drove up to the house, where we were to live, it was an older frame house badly in need of some tender loving care, but the outside of the house was the smaller shock than the one that greeted me inside. There were five rooms and one bath, and three couples, plus the landlady, were the residents. One couple slept in the parlour, Walter and I would be in the living room, the landlady slept in the dining room, and another army couple were ensconced in the bedroom. There were no halls so everyone traversed all the other rooms to get to the bathroom, which boasted a huge old fashioned footed bathtub. Our closet was a portable affair which barely held Walter's uniforms with my things tucked into nooks and crannies. We had a screen to dress and undress behind in case of heavy traffic. Our rent was $ 7 per week, and didn't include kitchen privileges, so we had to walk the few blocks to town to the only restaurant which hadn't been declared "off-limits" to soldiers, because the others hadn't passed the health inspection. It was located in Dalhart's only hotel, and the menu never changed; no matter what you ordered it was always accompanied by black-eyed peas. One of the couples in our house became our closest friends, and we've remained so to this day. Parker and Helen Rogers made our seven month stay in that very strange set -up, not only congenial, but pleasurable. Our landlady had informed us that we'd land in the street if she caught us taking a drink or playing cards in her house, so we played bridge on one of the beds, when she was out of the house. Helen had a sandwich toaster, that we took into the bathroom to make cheese sandwiches on; then we'd heat up a can of soup on top of the small bathroom heater to avoid making the trip to town, especially when it snowed and was so cold. I remember the first time I had clothes freeze on the clothesline and I was afraid to touch them for fear they'd break. The only facility for washing our clothes was the bathroom sink so that was an every day pastime. After we'd been there for a few weeks Helen and I asked the landlady if we could have kitchen privileges, for an extra fee, of course. We were thrilled when she said "yes" even though it took us two full days to get the kitchen clean enough to cook our first meal. The landlady's husband had dies the previous Sept. and she hadn't washed a dish or cooking utensil since that time. There were dirty dishes piled high in the sink, dishes and pans, some half full of cooked food, with green mold on top, covered the large table in the middle of the floor, and the pantry shelves contained the same welcome sight. But, we happily scrubbed and cleaned, even though the landlady was terribly insulted and let us know it in no uncertain terms. It was a sad time when Parker, who was in the class just ahead of Walter, graduated and was soon on his way overseas, while Helen went to her home in Carthage, Missouri. By that time I'd gotten to know some of the pilots' wives, so I didn't get too lonely during the day.