1917 Letter 3
[1917]
Dear Mother –
Here it is Friday again and another week has gone without a letter to you. I have written you all about the Investiture last Saturday and hope it reaches you.
It was a great experience and I wish now I had it to look forward to instead of its being past. But with us the R.R.C. is the only honour to be had practically so there is a very slim chance of my ever going up again. I’m not greedy but I like a lot don’t I?
Everyone is decent enough to be delighted and there is a big dinner to be given by the staff here as soon as I’m back on duty again. Unfortunately I didn’t feel much like celebrating at the time.
Saturday was one of the rainiest, bleakest days of the year and as we had to go in our cotton kit with our capes I got more cold, and have stayed in religiously all week getting rid of it.
My cough is entirely gone now and I’ve not had so much colour for years. I’m getting fat too and really this cold has been a godsend to me.
I didn’t realize it at the time but 2 years of tent life is bound to tell on one and the reaction is sure to set in when one is back in comfort again.
However [Bushy] is just for "crocks" and I feel so contented staying off knowing that the others aren’t overworked.
Andy is off too – same cold, same cough, same pain. So it isn’t anything peculiar to me or due to my own state of health.
We have our breakfast in bed and get up when we feel like it, go out for a walk if it’s fine and go to bed right after dinner.
The Colonel is a dear and can’t do enough for us. It’s worth while being sick to find out just how nice people can be.
To-day it is cold and snowing so I’m not going out. We have been reading the Report of the Dardanelles Commission in this morning’s Times. Such a record as it is! and most of all to us who saw it in the making. I don’t think France will ever interest me again after that. We lived it all so intensely.
I’ll send the paper to you, to read for yourself, also Sir Edward Carson’s speech.
I’m also thinking of sending Papa the Times for his birthday. It is the paper here and every word in it is worth while.
I am taking this rest for what it is worth just now and am not attempting to do any thing for I believe that we’re all going to work harder this year than we have in the past. There are more Can. hospitals opening up every day which means a greater need of Sisters and on the other hand the submarine menace makes the fresh supply from Canada uncertain, and possibly unavailable in future.
I shall put in to go to Treport to Myra if I am moved from here. It’s better to be with friends, no matter where.
And I’m thinking seriously of transport
[letter incomplete]