The big news here is that your father has accepted a new position, and we’re moving to—Indiana! The town is Hadleysburg, about an hour outside Indianapolis, and the U.C.C. there has a very engaged congregation. The interim pastor is leaving at the end of June, and we’ll relocate as soon as Judson finishes the school year. Hadleysburg is attractive for many reasons. The cost of living is lower, your father will finally have his own church again, and his pastoral duties will be lighter, so he can do other work for pay. Perry’s second stint at Cedar Hill was a terrible financial blow, and we haven’t been able to repay the money we borrowed from your sister, let alone the money of yours that was lost. Your father had talked about going back to Lesser Hebron （！） and petitioning the brethren for reacceptance in their community, because he wants a simpler life, but financially that’s no longer an option and Hadleysburg is plenty simple for me. Judson can go to a regular school and I can have a glass of wine without being excommunicated, but it’s a small and close-knit community, with fewer temptations for Perry. He swears he doesn’t have more drugs hidden away, but after his relapse I don’t know that I can ever trust him, and I won’t be sorry to leave this house—all I can see is places where he might have hidden drugs.
Perry is polite to us and seems to appreciate our help, but he has no energy and very little “affect.” He says the electroshock harmed his powers of recall, and he hates the side effects of his new medication. Even if he could finish high school （he hasn’t completed a course in almost two years）， I don’t yet see how he could go away to college. For the moment, I’m afraid there’s nothing to be done but watch over him and pray that he gets better on his new medication. Dear Clem, I know your feelings about the efficacy of prayer, but if you could ever find it in your heart to say a little prayer for your brother, even if you don’t think it will change anything, it would mean a lot to your mother, and to your father too.
Judson remains a joy. He’s starring in the sixth-grade “musical” and reading at tenth-grade level. He feels for Perry and he understands how burdened your father and I are, but he never seems to brood about it. When Perry had his calamity, I worried it would take away Judson’s childhood and he would lose that innocent capacity to enjoy things. I can’t tell you what a blessing it is, when I’m having a bad day （I won’t bore you with that）， to see him playing outside with the Erickson girls or watching the news with your father （he’s tape-recording all the Watergate news for a social-studies report） or just eating his dinner with so much gusto. Perry says the medication makes everything taste the same to him, and if there’s something Judson is especially enjoying, Perry passes his plate and lets him take more of it. Since he came back from Cedar Hill, the only real glimmers I’ve seen of his old self are when he’s with Judson. David Goya stopped by twice at Christmas （he’s a sophomore at Rice now）， and Larry Cottrell, God bless him, comes over every week （his mother left the church, but he’s still in Crossroads）， but Perry doesn’t seem to care much either way. The fear that he’ll try to harm himself again is with me night and day, and I’m afraid it always will be.
We continue to see your sister and Tanner in church. They sit at the back in case Gracie starts crying and Becky needs to step out. I make an effort to talk to her after the service, but it’s like talking to a locked door—she will not take her eyes off Gracie. I think I told you they have their own apartment now, above the record store, and I offered to come by with some things, some old linens and baby blankets and toys, because I know money is tight. Becky didn’t get her back up, she just smiled and said no thank you, they didn’t need anything. Everything is done with a smile—declining my invitations to dinner, excusing herself from the holidays, refusing to let me hold her baby （and then I turn around and see a parishioner holding her）。 Lord knows, she has reason to be angry with me, but her coldness just breaks my heart. Tanner is as nice as ever but gets nervous when Becky sees us talking to him—she pretends to be immersed in Gracie, but she’s obviously watching him. She says she’s very happy, and maybe she is. I imagine she’ll be even happier when we leave for Indiana.
There’s a search committee for the new associate minister, and we hear that Ambrose is at the top of the list. I think, if he takes the job, it will help your father close the door on New Prospect. He’s been so changed since the calamity, so chastened and humbled, I honestly think he could have wished Rick all the best, if only Rick hadn’t officiated at Becky’s wedding. （It was her choice, but, really, what was Rick thinking?） My hope is that having his own church, with no Rick in the picture, will give your father a fresh start, because he still has so much to give. I’m enclosing a sermon he wrote about coal mining on the Navajo reservation, after Keith Durochie died. It was so good, I sent it in to “The Other Side,” and now your father is a published author. He wasn’t happy I submitted it without telling him, but I don’t think he’ll mind me sending it to you.