Sometimes things are bad. So bad that you feel to blame for everything, so bad that the boss is clearly considering binning you and so bad that the frustration, embarrassment and sheer exhaustion of having worked so hard for so long with so little result, spills out of you, hot tear by hot tear.
And the scrutiny of your every move – by dissatisfied colleagues, the media and the markets – means you’re not even permitted the privacy to dry your tears. Instead they must dribble to a halt, congealing on your powdered face long enough to ensure everyone gets the shot for the morning’s front pages.
And when things are that bad, there is only one thing that happens… things get better.
As surely now they must for Chancellor Rachel Reeves, this beleaguered government and the country.
Those around Reeves insist her tears were caused by a personal issue but obviously the pressures of recent days and weeks were instrumental. Why bother denying it? Did they fear such supposed weakness would spook the markets? Too late: that was already done by the sight of the Chancellor’s distress fuelling a surge in UK 10-year borrowing costs and a drop in the value of the pound. Oh, the curse of being Chancellor – even a tear comes with a cost.
Undeniably there was much for Reeves to cry about. This week saw the almost complete vaporisation of welfare reforms, which were supposed to save £5bn. Last month there was the U-turn on ending the winter fuel allowance, which is set to cost another £1.25bn. Rebels sniffing salty tears will continue to push for the two-child cap on benefits to be lifted; a U-turn on non-dom rules looks likely, too.
Meanwhile businesses struggle under the weight of the increased minimum wage and the national insurance contribution hike, while farmers and family businesses are fearful of inheritance tax relief changes.
Then there are the perma-critics; those who blame her for being a slave to her fiscal rules, a prisoner of her refusal to hike taxes for working people, a lickspittle to business but a traitor to the working classes, a bureaucrat incapable of meeting the British people on an emotional level.
Well, now she is blubbing behind the despatch box. Is that enough emotional incontinence for the Instagram generation? And all those straight-up misogynists who tried to bully and belittle her with the “Rachel From Accounts” slur – are they happy now?
Rachel Reeves did everything she was tasked to do by a party that needed power to bring about the change the nation craved.
Without painstakingly building a reputation of fiscal credibility and sticking to iron clad rules, there is a very real possibility Labour would never have gained power. Many will reject that, but for the poor of memory, it was a risk no one was in the mood for taking just one year ago.
She inherited tax cuts from Jeremy Hunt which had the potential to sabotage the next government’s chances of survival.
Reeves tried to tell the nation the truth about black holes and grim findings under the bonnet but was attacked for being too glum, so she dyed her hair red and started smiling a bit more.
And she has stuck to the rules she said she would for fiscal credibility and in a bid to rebuild trust in politics after the charlatans that went before. But meantime everyone started watching Gary Stevenson on TikTok and decided Labour should have gone into the election promising to tax the rich and unleashed a bit of old-fashioned class war.
A year on from a stonking landslide victory which ended 14 wilderness years for Labour, everyone is a flipping expert as to how Reeves and Starmer cocked it up before they began. Oh the benefit of hindsight and LBC phone-ins.
Even a cab driver asked me the other day: “Where’s The Narrative?”
“I dunno, mate… somewhere near High Barnet?”
The only thing that matters now is foresight.
So what would Taylor (let’s not mention the free tickets again) Swift, do? “It’s okay to cry a river, just remember to build a bridge and get over it,” is her line.
How does Reeves build that bridge? Recently she said: “Contrary to some conventional wisdom, I didn’t come into politics because I care passionately about fiscal rules.”
So show it. She must show the country what she does care about and how she’ll use the public purse to achieve it. Reform must not be dodged where reform is needed. She must stop being a handmaiden to rules and rebels. And strain every sinew to address the grinding inequality that lies behind so many of our social problems.
The election was won a year ago. That fight is done. It’s OK to toss the Ming vase around a little now. After all, for this Chancellor, things really can only get better.
Alison Phillips is a former editor of the ‘Daily Mirror’; she won Columnist of the Year at the 2018 National Press Awards