Time, I think, to give credit where credit is due. Martha is an incredible woman, doubly so for having sanctioned a year of madness in the name of me putting myself aright, but to say she was solely responsible for me being who I am today would not only be unfair, ultimately, it would be wrong. Her immediate predecessor, a woman known far and wide as Gee-Anne, deserves credit more than anything for keeping my ability to love running. In the five-ish years I have known Gee now, I have actually been in her presence probably about a week, including several days when I simply kept a promise and was there when she awoke from major surgery. What it's really about is what I like to refer to as "meshing on the fine teeth." Almost any man and woman mesh on the mighty turning cogs of their respective realities; the real trick is to find someone who meshes on that which is more intricate, and precise, in who you are. Whether those teeth in me are just ultra-fine, or merely oddly spaced I don't know. But finding that mesh has been a real trick. Martha has succeeded not only in meshing on those teeth, but in adapting to my sometimes-odd, always-active, self-view and reality. Realistically, the question could be asked why, in the wake of such affection, Gee lives her life and I live mine. Chalk it up to the respective exigencies of co-parenting, in her case, and mine. In the days following the end of my first marraige, what hurt most was the fact that I couldn't read my daughters a bedtime story every night. And believe me, spending the time that I have, and will, not seeing them at all has been tough enough. But, as I've stated before, I had to do it for myself. Choosing a life with Gee would have been just as counterproductive in that regard, and whatever developed, would in all likelihood, not have endured, I think. I'd be loathe to force a life in Detroit on any person not fully accustomed to such an existence. So, there lives what affection I bear for her, in a little hermetically-sealed glass bubble in my heart, covered in two-way mirror, and unsullied by any variety of day-to-day reality. To open it would be to open Pandora's Box, and I'm not goin' there. Some things are simply not meant for one's workaday reality. Think Ilse Lund in Casablanca; frequently, it's simply best if you'll always have Paris. And having said that, Martha, sweetheart, you are no lower in my esteem, or love, simply as a result of you being the one the one who is there day after day. On the contrary, what seperates the real deal from the wannabes is about what survives; *how* it survives is the real distinction. Are you going to be the one who takes care of it every day, to the best of your ability, or leave it in the museum? Take your pick. A Ferrari Daytona is no less beautiful or desirable to me than a Duesenberg, but I wouldn't take the Duesenberg out in Detroit traffic, either. You know what I mean. I hope everyone involved knows what I mean.