The Embraceable Computer
Wednesday, Jun. 30, 2004, 9:21 p.m.

QUESTION: Did you miss me too?

WHAT I LEARNED: You can hug a computer.

My computer is back in action. The world seems brighter now. Oh how I love my computer � even though it is evidently a totally unrequited love. Still, unrequited or not, I miss my computer when it�s not around, I think about it when we are separated for a few hours, it�s the first thing I visit after the bathroom most mornings, it knows more things about me than my mother does. I�ve got it bad. And even when it betrays me with technological malfunctions due to computer carousing or bad computer life-choices, causing me to lie on the sofa in a prone position favored by devastated literary heroines in the midst of a proper case of the vapors - I still love my computer.

Even this past Saturday when I found myself suddenly computer-less and resolved to recline on the daybed in our family room like a lazy iced-tea chugging Ophelia, I couldn�t be angry with my fickle laptop. I packed it in a box and whispered Goodbye for now, my love. Come home soon and don�t have too much fun - before sinking into the mire of a dark depression in which ruminating over my probable culpability for the computer malfunction figured predominantly.

And as I filled out the shipping form, in triplicate, I reminisced about our magic moments together and dreamed of all the wonders that resided on that perverse little hard drive - digital Kodak moments, musical interludes, various imperative work documents, and every good, bad, and indifferent writing effort I have recently attempted. I need my computer � as fair-weather a pal as it is. And so tonight, it has arrived back from computer-fixit-land and I welcome it home with open arms, a big fat kiss, and no questions asked about what it�s been up to or who it has been talking to while it�s been recuperating. Sometimes it�s better to just pick up the pieces and get on with things.

Computers � can�t live with them, can�t live without them.

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