The End of A Romance?

Ima’s father had wanted her to go with him to the Inaugural Ball in 1903, but she was apparently eager to get back to New York--and perhaps, to the young man named R. W. Alexander.

         He was very likely the one in a letter Ima’s best friend, Vivian Breziger, wrote to her on January 23, 1903, answering a letter from Ima about a romantic crisis. Vivian wrote:

          “Your letter came yesterday and I am dying, dying of curiosity --why in the world do you tell me so little--I want to know the details, the particulars and the whole business. I am thunderstruck at your insinuations, for I never had any idea “He” was a work of that style. When I run across such things as this--I begin to think I don’t know the world so well, after all! O gee--didn’t he make you sick at this tender leave taking. I can just see you up in our “boodwar” a sobbing and a sniffling! Poor old Sissy--poor old Sissy!        

         Alas, we don’t have Ima’s answer, the one she wrote to Vivian next, with the requested details.  But Vivian’s reply on February 6 refers to “poor Alec!” (Is it too much to assume that this was R. W. Alexander? Had he returned after his “leave taking”?) Vivian goes on: “Sure and you are driving him distracted with your foolishness--” (Was Ima angry and refusing to make up? Did she end the romance? At any rate, that is the last we hear of R.W. Alexander.)

         Perhaps to cheer her up, Vivian wrote to Ima on March 2, begging her to come to Austin for Commencement festivities at the University of Texas. “We could certainly have a rousing time,” said Vivian, “and I would give anything if you could.”

         But Ima stayed in New York, working away at her music.

This would be her last term at the National Conservatory--but she would have other romances.