Aggrieved that her beloved father had retired from retirement to get back into the intrigues of early American politics, mounted a vigorous and all-consuming presidential campaign and moved from Monticello to the nation’s capital, Martha took a break from their lively correspondence.  When she did finally write after he was elected president she did not congratulate him on his win or make any other mention of the presidency.

Damn!

Thomas Jefferson, now president, was long accustomed to keeping his darker passions subdued.  In fact, most biographers site his whipping of his horse bloody as one of the only outward signs of anger he ever showed.   His beloved daughter’s silence finally got to him, though, and he wrote to her:

“It is a terrible thing that people will not write unless they have materials to make a long letter when three words would be so acceptable.”1

Dig it.

1: Thomas Jefferson, An Intimate History; Fawn M. Brodie  p. 327