Who needs a writers' support group when you've got friends and co-conspirators like mine?

I got three great e-mails over the last 36 hours. First one was from my platoon commander back in the war, Marine First Lieutenant Patrick McKinley--a great friend. Then came one from Dan Murphy, Cairo Bureau Chief for the Christian Science Monitor, who went on Operation River Blitz with us back in March 2005 in the Anbar city of Hit. The most recent of the three was from my old college professor/mentor, Robert Sledd.

Murphy helped get Jill Carroll free and has spoken on National Public Radio about the matter and is just an excellent writer, and McKinley helped keep his troops alive and in the fight back in Iraq. Sledd critiqued my manuscript and had the best feedback I could ever have hoped to receive, so I am poised to finish my re-write of the book, which should turn a well-written but disjointed account of war into a well-written, cohesive account of war.

My father always said the idea of the "self-made man" pulling himself up by the bootstraps is a crock of shit. He's right--behind anything or anyone that is deemed worthwhile is a whole troop of contributors who support the individual. The encouragement I've gotten, direct or otherwise, from these three men who I hold in the utmost esteem help keep me going forward as a writer.