My wife wants to thank the readers who responded to a recent column of mine.

She's thrilled. Because of your e-mails, I won't be buying a bass boat anytime soon.

In that column, I told you I was falling out of love with computers and was considering trading mine in for a bass boat. I invited you to tell me how you feel about the computers in your life --- love 'em or hate 'em.

Turns out you love your computers. The prettiest girl in 11th grade never got this many love letters. That was a big surprise --- I figured there would be as many "I hate my computer" notes as mash notes. I was wrong. Only a few of you rooted for the bass boat.

What a diverse group you are: from high school students to folks in their 80s and 90s. I heard from stay-at-home moms, retired folks, computer geeks, an author of several books, the boss over at CNN.com. Grandmothers said they were just now falling in love with that beige box.

And one guy told me his true love is a 1,000-pound full-blown mainframe computer he keeps in the basement at home. I shared that e-mail with my wife, just to show her what a lucky woman she is.

Printing one or two of your responses in a regular column just won't do. You put too much of your hearts into them. So here are excerpts from a few of more than 100 notes. Let's get right to them:

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Many of you travel the world using a computer and the Internet. I think an e-mail from Madeline Jenkins Millard summed it up best:

"Thursday, through the magic of my computer and the Internet, I was able to listen to a live-from-Italy broadcast of an opening night opera, conducted by my hero-become-friend and the subject of my master's thesis. During the final curtain call, while the maestro was still taking his bows amid applause and bravos, I was able to send him a congratulatory e-mail. The next morning, when I checked my inbox, there was a reply saying, 'Delighted you could join us!' "

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John Irving --- no, not that John Irving --- was typical of those who are just now learning to love a computer.

"First and foremost, I am amazed I am writing to admit I really do love my computer. Five years ago, you could not have found a less likely candidate. I felt disinterested and angry as I watched computers taking over the workplace. Amazingly, since retiring a year ago, my PC has become a buddy. I used to feel computers had ruined the world. Yet as a guy who started out with great skepticism, I must admit my PC has provided much more pleasure than pain."

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I also heard from readers, who --- like my wife --- have me all figured out. I hate it when that happens. Roy Marsten was typical.

"I know you enjoy playing the 'old-timer,' but you are just a newbie. I wrote my first program in 1960 for an IBM 650. I have walked inside computers that were not on chips, or in boxes, but in rooms. I'm still programming today, and the computer is still as magic as ever because I use it to COMPUTE! I am a mathematician, and I use the computer as a time machine, to leap far into the future, to the ends of calculations that should far exceed my lifetime. It really is a magic box! Get a grip, Bill!"

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Marsten wasn't the only one who worried about my mental health. David Payne fretted, too. He is senior vice president and general manager at the CNN.com Web site.

"I'm a regular reader of your columns and was disheartened to see you have lost some of your passion for your computer. Believe me, as someone with two laptops and two desktops, and an entire computer-based organization to manage, I've had my own bouts of frustration in dealing with everything from spyware to viruses to major outages.

"But none of that frustration comes anywhere close to when my Internet connection is down, and I can't log in and see what's happening in the world. I feel totally disconnected. I don't even remember how to look up a phone number or get directions anymore without it."

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Kelly Mills summed up Payne's point best:

"It's not the computer that excites me, it's what I can do with it that makes me dance."

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A lot of the e-mail came from people like Jim Mahaffey. He's been around computers since his first date with one of them at Georgia Tech in 1970. He's seen computers get better, technically speaking.

"Now, I have a laptop that has 1,000 times the computing power of one of those old 3-ton machines. Speed and data storage size seem limitless."

But "the machine now spends most of its effort protecting me from advertising. I admit that I didn't see that problem coming. The thrill is gone."

Don't worry. He keeps an old lover downstairs.

"I have in a room downstairs a full-blown, mainframe computer, built in 1967! It's a lovable Digital Equipment Corp. PDP-8i, and it's nothing but fun. It has everything you'd want in an old computer, including the blinking lights, the screaming air blowers, a vector-graphics scope with joystick, a maximum memory system [32K words of iron-core\], 4 DEC tape drives, one nine-track tape drive, paper-tape reader/punch, and dual 8.5-inch floppy drives. It weighs probably 1,000 pounds, and it barely fits in the room."

It's a working antique. Mahaffey recently put it to work running a simulation of the Civil War. The machine discovered, he said, that "if you always open with an artillery barrage, if you provide the soldiers with plenty of food, and if you suspend salaries until after the war, the South wins easily, in seven battles. That, sir, was fun."

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Hey, we all have fun in different ways. Who better than a relationship counselor and the author of several books about the subject (available at Amazon.com) to explain the relationships men and women have with computers. Here's what Tina Tessina had to say:

"Yes, it drives me crazy. I'm firewalled, pop-up protected, regularly swept for viruses, and I still get way too much spam. But, mixed in with that spam are inquiries from new clients, praise and gratitude for my books, responses to the e-newsletter and questions from people who need relationship help. Every day, I approach the keyboard and monitor with enthusiasm. What magic will appear today?"

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All this warm and fuzzy talk about the computer is a little too heartwarming. Maybe we can cool things down with comments from Christopher Brown. I like the way he thinks:

"In the 1900s and 1910s, car owners had to travel with a mechanic. By the 1920s this was no longer necessary. I've been using computers since 1979 or 1980. It's been 26 years. Why do I still need tech support on at least a monthly basis at home and a daily basis at work?

"There's no technician there to help when your bagel explodes in the microwave, because bagels don't explode in the microwave. With my job I have to use a computer. There is zero choice. I'm forced to use a telephone as well but, happily, it works --- all day, all the time, day after day."

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David Briggs met computers and fell in love with them a long time ago, but he admits the romance has faded:

"I've gone from a tech early adopter to latent lagging neo-Luddite. It's a faded love. It was much fun being a pioneer in a brave new world. Now it's too complex and has transformed me into a data entry and printing clerk. I recently spent an hour trying to change a credit card for automatic billing [giving a whole new meaning to customer service.]

"Similarly, airlines have shifted ticket printing to purchasers. I sense a building backlash --- not against all innovation, but skeptical of feckless upgrades and complexity disguised as innovations. Does [the spreadsheet program] Excel need to talk?"

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Jacob Groothol would tell Brown and Briggs to put a little romance in their computing. The 73-year-old believes he would have married his old sweetheart had computers been around for him in those days.

"With the use of my PC, I have been able to locate a girl that I was engaged to in 1951 prior to leaving Holland for this great country. We stay in contact. During those years it took weeks for letters, and now she is just a few minutes away. I firmly believe that if we had computers in 1951, she would have been with me now as my wife."

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If you had sifted through the mail with me, you'd agree the overriding theme of America's love affair with computers is clear. As in Groothol's long-distance love affair, the computer has made it easier for us to talk.

Mike Burwen, writing all the way from Rancho Mirage, Calif., summed up the way instant communications have changed the world. He sent a fine e-mail, explaining how he felt about computers. Then, as a last word, he added:

"Finally, a guy from Georgia I never met asks me to write a story and send it to him. If I didn't have a computer, I wouldn't do it."

Thanks, Mike --- and thanks to all of you who wrote.

tecbud@ajc.com