New Hampshire

You should be with me.

Well, yes, Josh, and I would be if we’d had the conversation I wanted and you’d told me your plans. Timing was against us. Well, mainly your busy schedule and your unwillingness to put me first was against us.

I hate that I’m not with you.

I hate even more that I’m against you.

I hate that Will uses that to his advantage.

Don’t you think I would rather be with you? I know there's been all that water under those bridges... but I also know you were there in Germany waiting for me to wake up. You were there. I thought... Oh, it doesn't matter. I'm not putting it black on white. But I did really think...

And then nothing.

Nothing from you, just a bit more of the same banter, a bit more devotion, from time to time, enough to keep me hoping. Just enough to keep me dangling...

I waited, I thought maybe, this time, maybe...

And I thought when I quit, that maybe...

But nothing.

And if my personal life isn't getting the lift I've so foolishly been hoping for all these years, then at least I've made the right decision with my professional life. Oh, how I'd love to be with you. But I can't do it anymore, Josh. I just can't. It's not fun anymore. It's gut-wrenching. I just can't. This way I can at least focus on the job. As much as you can when your heart is breaking.

You should be with me.

What I wouldn’t have given to have you say that to me every time I went out with one of my gomers.

What I wouldn't have given to have you say that before it was too late.

It's too late now.

You had your chance, you had eight years, you had a campaign to run, and if you hadn't held onto me so tight as your assistant, you could have had me... in so many more ways.

You should be with me.

You know what? That ship’s sailed. I know you’re hurting. But you’re not a child and you need to take some adult personal responsibility. Please don’t lash out at me. If you can’t be adults about this, I’m getting my bristles out too. I have to protect myself.

You should be with me.

Well, yes.

Iowa

Tired. Tired. So tired.

Mom called yesterday and reminded me that normal people my age (with normal jobs) do not get up at 5.45 am seven days a week, for like, well forever, and asked me if I was doing okay.

The thing is, Mom, when I have ever been happy being a "normal person my age"? Hmmm? I know you'd like me to be. I know you'd like me to settle down and get married and get a nice office job that doesn't involve coffee beans and freezing to death in the snow listening to crazy people's views on how we shouldn't have income tax. You know what, part of me would like that too.

But I don't know if you will every understand how it feels to have been given this second chance at life.

I don't want to waste life anymore. Not one second of it. And if that means getting a little less sleep for a while...

Still, I'm tired.

Tired of all those buses and planes and meetings and late nights and early mornings and then all the smiling and nodding and intent listening and all the happy smilingness required to keep believing we can win, to keep wanting us to win.

Where's the buzz of that first campaign? Why do I feel like my heart is not in this? Not like it was? Is it just that I'm older and more jaded?

Tired, tired, so tired of fighting with Josh, fighting against him, tired of all these conflicting emotions that I don't have the time or the energy to analyse...

I miss him.

He's just there. Just the other side of this door. It's so pathetic that I want him to knock. But I don't want him to at the same time. It's weird and it's horrible and I miss the old Josh, the gather-your-rosebuds Josh, I miss us being us.

What I wouldn't give for one of his hugs. You know, from the old days, when we were Josh and Donna. When we were, let's be honest, "will-they-won't-they" - and not "well, I guess they haven't, and they won't, and that's that".

Or even before that, before I really realised how I felt. That hug from that second Christmas. That's the kind of hug I need. It's the kind of friend I need.

I'm so tired...

I'm leaving you

Josh,

This is one of those letters my counsellor suggested would be helpful for me to write, not to, you know, actually give you (heaven forbid that we might actually discuss our emotions), but because it might help me somehow. I’m sure she explained how, but there’s always so much I don’t remember in those sessions, it drives me crazy. I have to fight the urge not to make index cards in there, fight it with every muscle in my body. And this is exactly why. Anyway, I digress, which is something she says I do a lot. I guess you’d say the same.

There’s another reason I’m writing, too, and I know this might sound weird, although if you are reading this it will all make sense and you will be nodding your head. It may sound melodramatic, but if anything were to, well, happen to me I would want you to know this stuff.

I want you to know that I am not leaving you, although it will feel like that to you, and goodness knows this heart-breaking, gut-wrenching decision feels like that to me. Leaving this job – leaving you – is the hardest decision I’ve ever had to make.

And I do have to make it, Josh, and I know you won’t understand, but here’s the thing: not only do I only get one career, I only get one life. And I want it to count. I want to grow and I want to learn and I want to figure out if politics is really it for me, if it’s enough to drive me, or if it’s your passion that’s been energising me all these years and I’ve been running on someone else’s fuel.

I have to figure out who I am and what I want from life and when I’m with you all day every day I simply can’t see past the fact that what I want from life is, in fact, you.

And that because of that my dreams are tied up with yours and my successes and failures are all about yours, and I feel as if I’m losing myself, in fact I’m not really sure I've ever known who I am, really. My heart has been yours for so long that I don’t remember how it felt before.

I love looking after you, peppermint cream bits and all. I love that we’re such an effective team. I love that I’m the one you come to when you’re drunk in the middle of the night.

But I also hate that it’s all I am. I hate that my giving to you, my looking after you, can only go so far. A wise person forced me to look the truth in the face recently and she was right. It’s you that’s been keeping me here, you and my feelings for you and the certainty I’d be lost without you.

I can’t do it anymore, Josh. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that life is too short. I can’t come into work every day and pretend I’m happy being just your assistant and tying your shoelaces for you. It's not that I don't glady do all that. But I can’t do it in this role anymore. It’s been too long, I love you too much, and I’m too confused about life, and I don’t want to blow it.

And I need to get some air. I need to discover that I would not, in fact, be lost without you. I need to figure out how to be me, who I am, apart from you. I need to learn some more and try some new things and forge an identity for myself that doesn’t revolve around you.

That scares the hell out of me.

A huge part of me would so much rather stay in my comfort zone. I’m comfortable with you.

And man, oh man, I don’t want to leave you.

I hope, I hope you know that I am not doing this to hurt you.

But what I’m not comfortable with is the nagging accusation in the back of my brain that I’m allowing myself to be chained to a desk because I’m in love with my boss. If feminism has taught us anything – and not the ridiculous, bra-burning feminism (I’ll pause here while you regroup – mentioning bras may have been a mistake) but the sensible sort, lipstick feminism I think Ainsley once called it – it’s that we are not to expect our lives to somehow count less than men’s. That we are not to put our lives on hold for men. And for years now that’s what I have been doing. Or maybe it really has been my life too. But I just don’t know. And I need to figure it out.

So maybe in a way I am leaving you. Trial separation, let’s call it that. Like couples on the brink of divorce who try one last ditch attempt and hope they will realise they can’t live without each other.

Part of me, of course, would really much rather not come to that conclusion. Part of me hopes I can leave this desk, be done with you, done with this job, shake my head at how silly I’ve been, and walk away unscathed into new adventures and who knows maybe even new relationships.

But part of me desperately, desperately wants to come to the conclusion that you and I are in fact meant to be. That we are nothing without each other. That we do in fact have the same driving passions. That we do, well, fit. But of course, it’s all very well me coming to that conclusion, but unless you get there too, then it’s all pretty much a waste of energy.

So I’m giving us both this way out, even though I know you won’t want it. But maybe in time it will be for the best.

Maybe, just maybe, you will realise not just that you can’t function without me professionally but that deep down, emotionally, as a human being, you can’t function without me either. When that’s down on paper it sounds so arrogant. But to be ruthlessly honest, and this surely is the place for that, then that’s what I’m hoping we’ll both conclude. That we need each other desperately. And if we don’t, then it’s better for both of us that I’m out of here, so we can get on with our lives.

If we are meant to be – if I’ve not misread things, and I could not be less sure of how you feel about me – then I’m sure it will all come out in the wash. Who knows, maybe it will bring you to your senses and you will remember some of that wise advice of mine and try the wooing thing.

If we’re not, then I need to get my head together, and start making the most of this second chance I’ve been given at life. I don’t want to waste it, Josh. I don’t want to waste it pining after my boss. Life is too precious.

I love you, Josh, and that’s why I’m leaving you.

No Exit... well, I'm going to find one!

I couldn’t face him. I couldn’t look at him.
I had to get out of there, clear my head, get some air.
I wish I could say she was wrong.

But man, are they right when they say it’s the truth that hurts most of all – though admittedly it could have been delivered slightly more kindly. More gently. And maybe a few years ago.

It felt like something she had been trying not to say for so long, that just came rushing out when I pressed the wrong buttons. And I don't know why I did that. Well, I do - self-defence. I was hurting. But that was badly calculated. It just led to more truth, and therefore more hurt.

I like CJ, I love her even, I respect her, in so many ways I want to be like her. So hearing that from her...

But I do wish she’d been kinder about it. Maybe coffee and chocolate to soften the blow, you know.

But she’s right. Of course she’s right.

And you know what? She’s right too that I need to sort myself out. It’s been long enough. My heart and my life have belonged to him for long enough.

It’s time for some new adventures.
Right after I sort out my running mascara...