F. Scott Fitzgerald to Zelda Sayre
Spring, 1919
Sweetheart
Please, please don’t be so depressed–We’ll be married soon, and then these lonesome nights will be over forever–and until we are, I am loving, loving every tiny minute of the day and night–
Maybe you won’t understand this, but sometimes when I miss you most, it’s hardest to write–and you always know when I make myself–Just the ache of it all–and I can’t tell you.
If we were together, you’d feel how strong it is–you’re so sweet when you’re melancholy. I love your sad tenderness–when I’ve hurt you–That’s one of the reasons I could never be sorry for our quarrels–and they bothered you so– Those dear, dear little fusses, when I always tried so hard to make you kiss and forget–
Scott–there’s nothing in all the world I want but you–and your precious love–All the material things are nothing.
I’d just hate to live a sordid, colorless existence-because you’d soon love me less–and less–and I’d do anything–anything–to keep your heart for my own–I don’t want to live–I want to love first, and live incidentally…
Don’t–don’t ever think of the things you can’t give me–You’ve trusted me with the dearest heart of all–and it’s so damn much more than anybody else in all the world has ever had–
How can you think deliberately of life without me–If you should die–O Darling–darling Scott–It’d be like going blind…I’d have no purpose in life–just a pretty–decoration.
Don’t you think I was made for you? I feel like you had me ordered–and I was delivered to you–to be worn–I want you to wear me, like a watch–charm or a button hole bouquet–to the world.
And then, when we’re alone, I want to help–to know that you can’t do anything without me…
All my heart–
I love you
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