Monday, October seventh.
Yesterday I wrote nothing in the diary—there was nothing to write, but that it rained. “Rain like Hell” Olson’s journal doubtless reads,—and ditto for to-day.
The storm is even harder now. The wind strikes our cabin first from the west, then north, east, and south. The surface of the cove is seething under the cross squalls; that is called the “wullys.” A boat not strongly managed would be whipped round and round. Olson has been much in to see us, lonely old man! I drop my drawing while he is here and take to stretching canvass, all the while yarning with him. Rockwell likes the calls as a diversion. Rockwell’s good humor and contentment is without limit. He draws with the deepest interest hours a day, reads for a time, and plays—talking to himself.
NIGHT
We have good hearty fights together in which Rockwell attacks me with all his strength and I hit back with force in self-defense. We have a good time washing dishes, racing,—the washer, myself, to beat the dryer. Rockwell falls down onto the floor in the midst of the race in a fit of laughter. Rockwell’s happiness is not complete until I spank him. I grab the struggling creature and throw him down, trying to hold both his hands and feet to have free play in beating him. This I do with some strength sometimes using a stick of kindling wood. The more it hurts the better Rockwell likes it—up to a limit that we never reach.
So much for the day’s play. Of our work mine is mostly over the drawing table. Both yesterday and to-day I made good drawings; and my ideas come crowding along fast. Cooking, somehow, is the least troublesome of all the daily chores. We live, as may be imagined, with a simplicity that would send a Hoover delegate flying from the door in dismay. This is our daily fare:
BREAKFAST
(invariably the same)
Oatmeal
Cocoa
Bread and Peanut Butter
DINNER
Beans (one of several kinds and several ways)
or
Fox Island Corn Souffle
or
Spaghetti
or
Peas
or
Vegetable stew (barley, carrots, onions, potatoes)
and
Potatoes or rice
and (often)
Prunes or apricots or apples (dried)
SUPPER
(invariably the same)
Farina
Corn bread with peanut butter or marmalade
Tea for father, milk for son
And sometimes dessert—stewed fruit, chocolate, or, when Olson
gives it, goat milk junket.
Let us here record that to this date we have had not the least little sickness,—only glowing health and good spirits.