One day at a time.

Picture Michael of that '80s TV show thirty-something-twenty years later. Yeah, the ad guy with the wife named Hope.

The World Trade Center disaster just turned the world upside down, and his grown children were living in New York City when it happened.

He's a writer, so he writes.

He loses his job, so he writes.

He has great times with his son and daughter, so he writes.

His son gets cancer, so he writes.

He finds that writing every day puts a better spin on things, so he writes.

He's separated from his wife of thirty-two years, so he writes.

He's getting a lot more sex than when he was married, so he writes.

He loves coming up with big ideas and fantasies, so he writes.

He's temporarily living in an old friend's spare bedroom in his favorite neighborhood. The old friend is a single woman he has worked with in advertising, and he's always been attracted to her. They're having a fling, so he writes.

He feels justified about the fling because he feels betrayed by his wife, so he writes.

He had been forced to walk out on her after she had turned on him without warning during dinner at a nice restaurant, vehemently accusing him of not having her back. He would have never even thought of saying some of the invalidating, emasculating disrespect she had blindsided him with. Every time he thinks about it, his ears still burn from the harshness of the words coming out of her mouth. Nothing she had ever done had prepared him for her coldly pulling the rug out from under him. It was so out of character for the mother of his children, whom he thought he knew. So he writes.