Dear Sir, - I am 23 years of age and have been going out to business for five years, being engaged in the office of which my father is a director.
When I commenced going to business, I used to travel on the same bus as a very charming one-legged girl. After a few mornings we spoke to each other, and soon became friends. She could hop quite nimbly on and off the 'bus on her one leg with the aid of a single crutch.
She came home with me one evening and my parents said she could come and live with me, because she had told me she had lost her parents and was in digs.
The first night when we were having a quiet smoke in the bedroom just before getting into bed, she told me she was only 16 when she lost her left leg, which had been amputated just above the knee.
As time went on, I grew to admire more than ever the graceful way in which Margaret hopped along on her crutch, on all intents quite unconscious as to the loss of her leg. Little did I dream that I, too, was destined to become one-legged. However, three years ago I fell down stairs, badly fracturing my right leg, from which complications set in. One morning in the nursing home the doctor gave me a thorough examination and then injected something in my knee. This must have sent me off to sleep, because when I woke up the lights were on in my room.
When the nurse saw that I was awake, she asked me how I felt, I told her I felt quite drowsy and my right leg seemed all on fire, which I could not move, and my thigh was jumping in a most erratic manner. She told me that my leg had been amputated that morning above the knee, and that the jumping was caused by the nerves.
Next day Margaret came in to see me and, propping her crutch against the wall just inside the room, she hopped on her one leg to the bedside and, and with her delightful smile said, "You will be doing this, Doris, in a few weeks, but it will be on the opposite leg to mine." She was a brick to me after my leg had been amputated, almost making me forget that I was one-legged.
One day when Margaret came I was wheeling myself about in a chair, and whilst she was there a nurse measured me for a pair of crutches. Under her guidance at home I soon got used to hopping about on crutches, and she came away with me to the seaside for a few weeks whilst I was recuperating from the loss of my leg. She left her firm for this purpose, and when we got home she commenced with the firm my father is connected with. We had a nice time; but, my word, didn't we two one-legged girls come in for a lot of attention from everyone as we hopped along, Margaret on one crutch, and poor me on a pair! However, in six months I was back to business, a happy one-legged girl, and hopping also on only one crutch.
Of course I am now quite acclimatised to only having one leg, and can hop about the bedroom like my friend, without the aid of my crutch, whilst I am preparing my toilet and dressing in the mornings. I should imagine we make a rather unusual sight happing about one-legged together.
Incidentally, we have both been using a pole crutch now for about twelve months. This type of crutch is much lighter and easier to handle than the bow type. They are sprung under the armpit rest with another internal spring at the bottom, which with one's pressure sinks into the thick rubber pad at the crutch end, thus obviating any jarring under the arm and also being quite silent with this kind of pneumatic idea.
Our latest stunt is to wear trousers with one leg cut short, and this also applies to our pyjama suits. It is undoubtedly better than having an empty trouser leg dangling and flapping helplessly about.
The bus conductors on our route are cheerful fellows, and as we hop on and off they always chaffed us about our missing legs.
It is all meant in good fun, and we appreciate it as such and give them as good back again. After all, because we are one-legged we not take any more seriously.
We have quite a number of boyfriends who seem to vie with one another to take us out, for some reason preferring Margaret and I to their two-legged friends. Of course we do not mind this, but I must confess that when we are alone we often debate as to the reason why our one-legged condition should appeal, as it undoubtedly does, so obviously to them. It certainly is a little incomprehensible, particularly from our point of view.
I am rather inclined to think that perhaps some one-legged readers may look upon us as a couple of silly one-legged tomboys, but having our legs amputated at such an early age, makes it easier to ignore the loss of a leg, and also enables us to get about quite as agile on the one leg which Fate has decreed we should only possess, as some people can on two.
I hope you can publish this letter, which I can assure you comes from two of your regular one-legged girl readers who do not suffer any qualms about their loss, and who also hope that all other one-legged readers can look on their incomplete state in the same way.
Yours truly,
Two One-Legged Girls.