Once a week, Daily Intel takes a peek at what your friends and neighbors are doing behind doors left slightly ajar. Today, the Mid-Divorce Mother: female, 50, Norwood (the Bronx), writer, straight, divorcing "after years of ambivalence."

DAY ONE
6:00 p.m.: Dinner and drinks with four women, all over 50. They are all so intelligent, funny, evolved, and alive.
9:00 p.m.: Two of the women are a couple who met on an Internet matchmaking service four months ago. I wonder if I shortchanged myself in life by never truly exploring bisexual possibilities.
11:00 p.m.: Go to sleep on couch. Soon-to-be ex-husband of sixteen years sleeps in the bedroom, 15-year-old son in his room.

DAY TWO
3:00 p.m.: Nipples get hard in aqua aerobics class. Think warm hands and hot breath would feel good on them.
10:00 p.m.: Watch rerun of Sex and the City.
1:00 a.m.: Dreamed I was in bed with a very handsome comic I am acquainted with. I was concerned that he's married (in real life he is) and I'm still married. I told the comic while his hand was between my legs, "You should know I am separating. I don't cheat." He got up and left the room. I think my dream was influenced by Samantha in Sex and the City.

DAY THREE
10:00 a.m.: Ponder how, in spite of my intelligence, I am attracted to men. What female in her right mind who watches the nightly news dates men?
5:00 p.m.: Consider sex with my husband. Remind myself that as good a lover as he is, I can't do it with him anymore. He'd tell me that I'm sending him mixed messages since we are trying to part. So I haven't had sex in forever. I think we should be apart before engaging with others.
7:00 p.m.: Decide to start writing another erotic story. They get me through, and sometimes they sell! Satisfied myself after writing a page. Then took a nap.
10:00 p.m.: So horny that I imagine my new apartment and fucking the new super, whoever he is.

DAY FOUR
11:00 a.m.: Imagine my next lover. The type of lover that turns me on is dominant. And since most dominant lovers are also dominant people, I have problems.
9:30 p.m.: I decide that I don't think I'd want to live with a lover again, married or otherwise. We don't need to live together for sex. We can visit each other. Good lover does not necessarily equal good husband.

DAY FIVE
1:45 p.m.: Confront husband on whether he's already begun seeing someone. There seemed to be signs, and if I am living up to our agreement to not start anything until we're apart, then he better. He swears he isn't. I believe him, like, 85 percent. He says he thought I was seeing someone.

DAY SIX
5:00 p.m.: One of my closest friends is over, and I mention needing a shower and make some joke about washing my pussy. I can't remember exactly what I said, but we laughed and laughed.
5:30 p.m.: Shower. Remember when my husband and I used to shower together. It is sad what we have become.
8:00 p.m.: I contemplate what I'll do when this is over. I wonder if I'll ever feel that I can be physically and emotionally open with anyone again.

DAY SEVEN
1:00 p.m.: Son spent the weekend at a friend's house. Husband and I we were free to argue, scream, curse, apologize, talk, cry, and do it all again. We must have needed it. We feel sad but less angry. Maybe.
9:00 p.m.: I am tired, sad, all cried out. Maybe because we were able to express so much, I might actually sleep next to him tonight. I don't know. We always got along best during sex. But all the uncommunicated anger and hurt stands in the way.

Total: One erotic dream, one erotic story, one act of masturbation, one fantasy.