The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Digital Edition > My Day
My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt

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NEW YORK, Thursday—Yesterday started in an amusing way. Late on Tuesday evening, I found I could obtain no seat on the plane I wanted to take to New York, so I decided to take the early one that left at 7:00 a.m. on Wednesday morning. I reached the airport with the conviction I always have, that in spring and summer one should go to bed early and rise early. At the ticket counter, I met Mrs. Allie Freed, who seems to travel back and forth almost as often as I do. She announced that she had been unable to sleep because she had to rise early, and then I realized I had been awake since 4:30 for that very same reason, though I had left word to be called at six!

In spite of all our hurry we started half an hour late, because one of the incoming planes had motor trouble and most of the passengers had to be transferred to other ships. The flight to New York was lovely and I had time to do quite a bit of shopping before my first appointment.

My cousin and her son lunched with me at the Cosmopolitan Club, where I saw a number of old friends. After that, I dropped in at a gallery on 57th Street, where the New York Society of Craftsmen is having an exhibition. There are beautiful examples of weaving, pottery, pewter, silverware and some lovely jewelry.

After this, I crossed the street to see the exhibition which Mr. Robert Jackson has on view at the Charles Morgan Gallery. He tells me has been at work for a year painting types of New York City Negroes and he has certainly done a very remarkable piece of work. The thing which struck me was that, for the first time, I looked at people who did not have the pathos of a sorrowful race mirrored in their eyes. There is only one drawing which gives one that feeling. He has caught the fine dignity in the head of Judge Watson, the abandon and grace of the dancers, a certain vitality which is close to the earth, but that "weltschmerz" which is the interpretation of the race given by so many artists, is hardly evident in the whole collection.

I was back at my apartment by 3:30 and had a succession of visitors. One wanted to go to Hollywood, one had a personal problem, one had a very good plan for helping to employ some of our youth if she could work it out. I was left with a short story and a play to read. Then Miss Thompson, Mrs. June Rhodes and I enjoyed a cup of tea and light-hearted, purposeless conversation from 5:15 on.

Later I went to the dinner in honor of Mrs. Henderson, who fifty years ago founded the predecssor to the "Vocational Service for Juniors," which does such good work in guiding young people that both state and nation have profited from its pattern. It was a nice dinner and you felt that all present wanted to give homage to her to whom homage was due.

This morning I have another dentist appointment and will visit my mother-in-law, who has been laid up with a cold for some days.

E.R.

(COPYRIGHT, 1940, BY UNITED FEATURE SYNDICATE, INC.)


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About this document

My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt, March 22, 1940

Roosevelt, Eleanor, 1884-1962
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Digital edition created by The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project The George Washington University 312 Academic Building 2100 Foxhall Road, NW Washington, DC 20007

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Digital edition published 2008, 2017 by
The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project

Available under licence from the Estate of Anna Eleanor Roosevelt.

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MEP edition publlished on June 30, 2008.

TEI-P5 edition published on April 28, 2017.

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Transcription created from a photocopy of a UFS wire copy of a My Day column instance archived at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library.
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