YALTA, March 10, 2010.
No Spring has ever dragged on so long for me as this one, and time merely drags and does not move, and now I realize how stupid it was of me to take you for granted. I have lost touch with your incredibly smooth swing without getting into touch with the rest of the league, and one can think of nothing in my position but to go drown myself in ale. I fear Winter has begun here again in Yalta— rain, cold, a league without you—simply disgusting.
The Mariners will be in Yalta in June; they will bring their scenery and decorations. All the tickets for the four days advertised were sold in one day, although the prices have been considerably lowered since you retired. They will give among other things Griffey bobble-head dolls, a magnificent tribute in my opinion. I will enjoy mine with great pleasure, although I am not fond of dolls, but the food at the park they say is marvelous.
How many consumptives there are here since you retired! What poverty, and how worried one is with them! The hotels and lodging-houses here won’t take in those who are seriously ill. You can imagine the awful cases that may be seen here. People are dying from exhaustion, from their surroundings, from complete home run withdrawal, and this in blessed Taurida!
One loses all relish for the sun and the sea….but never the Kid.
-A.P. Chekhov