strange. exhausting. secret agent man is playing on the radio and i'm about to collapse to bed. i spent the majority of the day elbow-deep in the entrails of windows95, configuring network drivers, binding protocols, and thrashing about with installers and manuals flying this way and that. a trip to the computer store, two network cards, nine chocolates, three donuts, four re-installs, and countless win95 reboots later, the network was visible, winGate was working, and our hatchling proxy server was pecking its way onto the net.

spent the day working like a dog on the net stuff, pressing on it and hoping the problem would keep up until the end of the day -- then i wouldn't have to think about the conversation with alison. technical hacking and kludging is refreshingly distracting that way.

when i got home, i started running the numbers and realized that i could do the same thing at home -- get ADSL cheap and run it to the rest of the machines on the network for a song. I spent an hour in frenzied bouncing, figuring the hardware i'd need, then ran to compusa to pick stuff up. came home empty-handed, and far more sober. nothing kills the thrill of geeking like a trip to compusa -- we need a frys around here! a place that actually STOCKS things! sigh.

i puttered, i pushed. it was eleven, and i hadn't seen any sign of alison...

<104.7> girl... i want... to be with you... *uh-huh* all of the time... all of the day... and all of the night...

i considered calling, but the clock crept farther and the chance of seeming natural and casual became infitesimally small. i can't find words, really, to describe my feelings during those couple of hours. fear? dread? a sense of the inevitable angstiness of my life? all of the above, maybe.

i felt there was some cliff that we'd driven over. alison and i would never be the same. maybe she'd never talk to me again, decide that she couldn't take the hurt of being around me. the emotional turnip.

[time passes]

alison connected. i startled and we talked. and it seemed totally normal. i was afraid to prod... but we talked. and it was good. her mother is doing better, she is working on the play, and working... i just feel so... inept. so dangerous. as if my moves might hurt a heart.

i admitted to myself that i want someone who doesn't /need/ me. perhaps someone who doesn't even want me. one half of me wants that because i could never hurt them -- if someone doesn't want me, how can they be hurt by my failings? the other half of me thinks, though, and says that i'm only longing for someone who is a full, independent person. someone i can complement. not complete. completion is God's job.

on that note i think i'll fall asleep; tomorrow and saturday, moving awaits.