I came by the house to take a shower. It's been one hell of a hot day, and I still have no air conditioning in the truck. They're supposed to get me by the terminal in Greensboro soon. We'll see how that goes. Gods. To have A/C again!

I've been thinking today about a nice woman who made a comment about M.E. Caldwell. Someone mentioned the comment to me, and it gave me a bit of a boost, so I thought I'd write her and thank her. Well, she sent me some tunes for moral support, and I had the bright idea of sending her the first chapter of Neima, which I've just put together.

Today, it dawned on me that I might very well look like some desperate freak who is clinging to a few kind words, like a stray cat you feed and then can't get rid of. Hehe. I really should think things through better. I doubt she ever expected that she would hear from me because of an offhand comment that was posted to a web page. I also doubt she ever thought I'd become a pain in the ass. I'll have to remember to offer my apologies.

Speaking of Neima, no one else has responded yet. I'm kind of disappointed. It's taken me awhile to hit the right chord on that first chapter. That's important, because everything else flows from there. Hopefully I'll have some feedback waiting for me when I get home this weekend. Well, if I come home this weekend.

I've also been thinking about revisiting Caldwell, and looking at what I could do in regards to finishing the book. If I trusted myself enough, I'd have to admit that it would certainly be easier to finish Caldwell's book than to start a new one from scratch with Neima. We'll see.

The final thing on my mind today is Mara. No, I'm not going through any more convolutions about what went wrong and why and who's feeling what. I really do think it's time to move on from this. I need to stop posting about Mara. Hell, now she's felt it necessary to post defenses in regard to my posts. I don't think this is constructive for either one of us. Yes, I admit I've been having a problem with this. Mara may not have been in love with me anymore, but I was certainly in love with her. It hasn't been quite as easy for me to just shut down. So I've struggled.

I hope I can remain friends with Mara. I wish her happiness. There will always be a tinge of bitterness when I reflect that she could have found it here if she had so wanted. Had I not always been the jailer. But I hope her future is full of laughing and dancing. And I hope this Chris is all she expects him to be.

However this sounds, these aren't barbs. Just reflections. I'm so tired of reflections. Sometimes I forget that the reflections are not the reality. How sad that we spend so much of our lives just staring at our own reflections.