LETTERS FROM HOME

Dec. 23, 1993

Dear Mom and Dad,

Leaving Cape Girardeau, I crossed paths with DC's parents on the way to Neosho. They took turns riding with me. First chance I've had to talk to them beyond the formalities. Good time.

At Neosho, the new nieces gave me a tour of their home. Devon was the guide, while Danika and Darcy demonstrated the bathtub and toilet, just like the hostesses on "Price is Right." They charm me.

Oklahoma, Texas and New Mexico were a blur of the world's largest McDonalds, kachina dolls for sale and long trains racing across the prairie. The traveling music you gave me has been very good company. Shelby Lynne sounds like a cross between you and Bonnie Raitt, Mom. Great songs, too. Especially "I Need a Heart to Come Home to." My sentiments exactly.

DC reports that having the clinic children for the baking party was fun, even if the train around the Christmas tree did get destroyed. Your Christmas gift for her will come in handy.

She says I've gotten her two gifts so far -- a set of tumblers and a camping ax. She also said that if I pay for her new fishing rod (gift number 3) it would bring her luck, so expect some smoked salmon to arrive soon.

I'm in Southern California now. It truly is an alternative reality. Outside San Bernardino, I stopped at Shenandoah: A Civil War Experience. It's a restaurant with battle plans and pictures of Grant and Lee on the walls. Thankfully, no shrapnel in the peach pie.

Riverside's landmark is a turn-of-the-century hotel that looks like a Spanish mission. Covers one square block, and it's filled with carved wood and Tiffany glass. Like being in a Southwestern medieval castle.

Life-sized mechanical figurines play Christmas music in the balconies on one side. My friend Patty gave me a niece-style tour.

My friends the Adams family are fine. One is working for the Los Angeles Times now, another just co-produced his first movie, "That's Entertainment, Part 3."

My ex-roommate Nick and his wife Critter are ecstatically expecting their first child in July. They said they'd loan me a book.

DC is so near and so far away. At least we're now living in the same state. "I'll be in Garberville by Christmas Eve for sure. She's invited 15 homeless people for dinner (actually we're fixing dinner for them at her church.) This is one of the things I love.

After that, we're in the family business. I will write and tell you about my new home. I know the people might seem a bit unusual by Missouri standards, But maybe I am odd as well, a man traveling to the music in his heart.

Like everything else since this other member of her family and I crossed paths last July, it has required only faith -- in the future, in each other and in ourselves.

Shelby Lynne:

"I need a heart I can come home to, Someone I can tell my secrets to. I need a heart I can hold onto, I need a sweet heart like you."

Love, Sam