Pre-Service Letter 2
[n.d.]
April 1st. 12 p.m.
Dear Mother,
Here it is the "witching hour" and while I wait for Hay to relieve
me for supper I'll try to start this letter to you, for it is over a week since
I wrote you last. Since I came on I have had five cases which is an average
of one a night and that means quite a lot of extra work - though minus the worry
now.
Yesterday Anne Mair of Belleville who is on night duty was talking about her sister and mentioned Hartford and Miss Sutherland and when we began to talk it over I found that her sister trained under Aunt Lauder and that Anne had been down there a couple of times. She says Aunt Lauder "queens" it around that place and gets everything she asks for, and that the girls all think the world of her. Anne is tall and dignified looking herself and she can imitate Aunt Lauder's walk and manner to the life. One of those post cards she sent me a long while ago was of Mair's sister's class. Molly Jones from Belleville that Aunt Lauder used to speak about was a great friend of Grace Mair's. Mother, what is the trouble with Aunt Lauder? It has gone on so long now that it has an air of finality about it, that worries me very much . I suppose my letter and yours had something to do with it, and looking back I know I acted in a very aggravating manner and forgiveness isn't very easy but I wish you and she could patch things up even if it doesn't include me, for all the time I think of it and wish it had been other wise. I did me a lot of good though; for one thing I began this new phase of my life on my own merits, without a relative's help, and having made a large sized mess of things at first has made me a lot more careful about trusting to my own judgment as I found out it wasn't very much good. I can see now why Aunt Lauder wished me to go to a larger hospital - as the field is large and the same amount of energy and application would keep one along just as well in a large place as in a small, but I can't get together a good regretful thought no matter how hard I try. For Mother, there's one thing. I've been happy here and that's quite a lot. The girls are all about the same as myself financially and as things were I shouldn't have had the same peace of mind if I'd gone to a larger place where there were a better to do lot of girls. I read a little thing from one of Dr. Grenfell's speeches the other day that I liked very much. He said "Joy comes not from ease, not from riches, not from the applause of men, but from having done things that were worth while"