Saturday, 1 - Monday, 3 May, 1943

Nurses Home
General Hospital
Nottingham

1.     5. 43                                                                                                  (20)

Dearest One,

Once again I sit down to write you a letter to go by ordinary mail.  I like to send you at least one letter every week by ordinary mail.  Airgraphs are alright but to me they do not seem very personal.  I think that air letters are the best of all to send, don’t you?

For myself – I am looking forward to the day when we need not send each other letters but will be able to tell each other everything.  That day cannot come soon enough for me.

To-day has been gloomy and raining nearly all the time.  Farrow is trying to persuade me to go to the “local hop” to-night.  It is about the only thing that one can do out here when it is wet.  The Welfare Hall where the dances are held is only a ten minutes walk away over a field.  I think that I shall go but have not made my mind up yet.  I shall see how I feel when I come off duty at 8.15 p.m.

Of course, going to a dance now is not like it used to be Darling – when you took me.

You said in your last letter that you were looking forward to the day when we could go to a really nice dinner dance together.  Mmmm.  So am I! !  That, Sgt. Bristow is a date! ! ! ..... and I shall not be late.

Do you know, I have only nineteen patients on my ward.  Six empty beds!  We have not been so slack since I came out here.  Of course we would get slack just when I am due back. (Over due now).  As you can gather, I am still at Selston.  Sister does not know either when I am going back.  I did expect going this week-end but “the powers that be” decided otherwise.

Sunday, 2. 5. 43

For the last half hour I have been laid at the front of the fire drying my hair and dreaming.  Yes, Darling, dreaming of you and our future life together “after the war”.  Dreaming, Dear, of that home – just yours and mine, which one day we will share.  Ah me!  “Patience is a virtue” so they say.  I should certainly be virtuous by the end of this war.

I guess that you often feel impatient though don’t you Dear?  Never mind, I think that we shall both appreciate our happiness all the more for having waited for it.

When I turn back the pages of 1942 I feel that way sometimes.  Do you remember the day I did not return from my “nights off”?  As if you could forget.  Kit and I were only discussing it a few nights ago.  Kit says she really did think that I would return a married woman.  That’s where I laughed.  Time and time again, especially since you went abroad, have I been glad that we were together those few extra days.

Re-reading one of your last letters I see that you are giving yourself a pat on the back for covering hard ground when we first met.

Darling, you deserve nothing less than a medal for it.  You know, “you made me love you, I didn’t want to do it, you made me care and I didn’t want to do it” (with apologies to whoever wrote those words)  Now, I am glad you did.

Monday  3. 5. 43

As I want this letter to go by to-day’s post I am having to finish it at lunch time.  I am not off-duty until 5 p.m. and the post goes at 4 p.m.  I am looking forward to to-morrow as it usually the day I receive a letter from you.  I thought that there might be a letter from home for me this morning but there was not.  If there had been I was going to tell you all the Grimethorpe news but now I am afraid I have nothing else to tell you.  I will be writing you an air letter to-morrow.

Until then, Darling, Au-Revoir.  Ever yours, Grace.