Words fail me to adequately describe what it was like to return to my beloved wife after a separation of more than a year. To see her beautiful face, to hear her lovely voice, and to hold her close was an incredible reward for the many days and months of separation and living apart. Our first days were spent trying to make up for all that had been lost. Soon we had to come down to earth to face the realities of the day. We disposed of our Philadelphia apartment by turning it over to Ardean's close friend and associate Helen Hawthorne, the directress of nurses at the Graduate Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Getting an automobile proved very frustrating. It was routine for auto salesmen to demand cash under the table for a new car, and I had decided I would not pay these bastards any of my hard-earned money as a bribe. This left me with few options. New cars were out of the question. Those who had not gone to war had long before been placed on priority lists for new cars when the manufacturers resumed making them. For shame on the major automobile makers, there was no preference given to doctors or returning war veterans. The automobile agencies we had dealt with before WW II had long since gone out of business. The situation was especially bad in New York City. In Philadelphia, through the intervention of my brother-in-law Leroy, who had returned to his position as vice president of a small bank and was doing business with a Buick agency, I was able to obtain a well-used Buick sedan for $1,200 without any bribes being passed. Ardean and I now had a means of transportation and we set out for New York. Here we found the housing situation in an unbelievable mess. Nothing was available for returning veterans no matter what they might be willing to pay. Finally, a good friend of ours, Miss Martha Swensson, came to our rescue by subletting a modest one-room studio in Greenwich Village on Carmine Street. Each morning, Ardean and I would scan the New York Times looking for an apartment to rent, to no avail. The doctors’- office situation was equally bad, except that the Columbia- Presbyterian Medical Center had built some new doctors’ offices in Harkness Pavilion expressly for returning veterans.