dear daddy-long-legs,

i've changed my name.

i'm still `jerusha' in the catalogue, but i'm `judy' everywhere else.

it's really too bad, isn't it, to have to give yourself the only

pet name you ever had? i didn't quite make up the judy though.

that's what freddy perkins used to call me before he could

talk plainly.

i wish mrs. lippett would use a little more ingenuity about choosing

babies' names. she gets the last names out of the telephone book--

you'll find abbott on the first page--and she picks the christian

names up anywhere; she got jerusha from a tombstone. i've always

hated it; but i rather like judy. it's such a silly name.

it belongs to the kind of girl i'm not--a sweet little blue-eyed thing,

petted and spoiled by all the family, who romps her way through

life without any cares. wouldn't it be nice to be like that?

whatever faults i may have, no one can ever accuse me of having been

spoiled by my family! but it's great fun to pretend i've been.

in the future please always address me as judy.

do you want to know something? i have three pairs of kid gloves.

i've had kid mittens before from the christmas tree, but never real

kid gloves with five fingers. i take them out and try them on every

little while. it's all i can do not to wear them to classes.

(dinner bell. goodbye.)