Maybe she shouldn't have done what she did with those chess games. Nothing more than my usual blundering happened until after my first ten moves; by that time I suppose she had absorbed the principles, and she took over. I was not fully aware of it until I saw you looking like a boiled duck. I had imagined my astonishing moves were the result of my own damn cleverness. * * * * * Seriously, Lester, think back to that evening. You've played in stiff amateur tournaments; you know your own abilities and you know mine. Ask yourself whether I could have done anything like that without help. I tell you again I didn't study the game in the interval when you weren't here. I've never even had a chess book in the library, and if I had, no amount of study would take me into your class. I haven't that sort of mentality; just your humble sparring partner, and I've enjoyed it on that basis, as you might enjoy watching a prima donna surgeon pull off some miracle you wouldn't dream of attempting yourself. Even if your game had been away below par that evening, and I don't think it was, I could never have pinned your ears back three times running, without help. That evening you were a long way out of _your_ class, that's all. I couldn't tell you anything about it at the time--she was clear on that point--so I could only bumble and preen myself and leave you mystified. But she wants me to write anything I choose in this journal, and somehow, Lester, I think you may find the next few decades pretty interesting. You're still young, some ten years younger than I. I think you'll see many things that I wish I might see come to pass--or I would so wish if I were not convinced that my choice was the right one. Most of those new events will not be spectacular, I'd guess. Many of the turns to a better way will hardly be recognized at the time for what they are, by you or anyone else. Obviously, our nature being what it is, we shall not change overnight. To hope for that would be as absurd as it is to imagine that any formula, ideology, theory of social pattern can bring us into Utopia. As I see it, Lester--and I think your consulting room would have told you the same even if your own intuition were not enough--there is only one battle of importance: Armageddon. And Armageddon field is within each individual. At the moment I believe I am the happiest man who ever lived. * * * * * July 20 All but the last ten years are now given away. The physical fatigue, though still pleasant, is quite overwhelming. I am not troubled by the weeds in my garden patch--merely a different sort of flowers where I had planned something else. An hour ago she brought me the seed of a blown dandelion, to show me how lovely it was. I don't suppose I had ever noticed. I hope whoever takes over this place will bring it back to farming; they say the ten acres below the house used to be good potato land, nice early ground.