Another dreadful day in war has finished. I’m tired of arriving every night here to my dormitory in the front line and having to write letters to tell families that their relatives have died in war and then having to delivery them. My job unfortunately consists of damaging peoples feelings and lives by doing this but is the only useful thing I can do in the war due to my physical incapacity. Having only one leg since the start of the war has been very hard for me but I’ve learned to control this terrible situation. One week ago another young soldier died and I had to write to an old lady telling her that her only son, Jack, died in war.
This is very hard for me because he was a defenceless, young soldier who wasn’t really prepared for the war and I feel guilty for making him fight in the trenches and die blown up into little pieces by a mine. In other words he was a coward; he felt angry towards the war and didn’t want to fight for his country but I couldn’t tell that to the woman. Last night my challenge started. I had to leave the front line to take the letter to Jack’s mother in a nearby county. The journey was long but I had to do this myself because it is my job and was partly my fault.
After a long painful ride in horse and then in car, finally I arrived at the old lady’s house, it was strange but I felt confident. I couldn’t imagine the old lady’s reaction but I was prepared for anything. I knocked on the door and a lonely woman with a very soft, passive voice opened the door. I did my entrance speech telling her I was a war officer, but she wasn’t impressed, she just made me enter the house and sit on a couch near the fire place. I noticed she’d been there all the afternoon drinking tea and playing cards alone.
She broke the silence by asking me what was the purpose of my visit and why was I staring at her with such a cold face. I kept quiet and my expressions were like a sick man. I started telling her that her boy was very brave in the war and that he had became an important soldier with an outstanding effort and dedication in the army. Every time a word came out of my mouth I felt even worse and tenser because I never imagined me lying to families so that they could be proud of their sons. What was even worse was the idea that the old woman believed that entire fake.
