1,977 words in after sleeping in a bit with a sick son this morning (following my six-day trip that featured five flights, five different hotels, three speeches, two rentals, and a culminating dinner at the Willard in DC with seniors from the Monitor Group [with Steve; we had a lot of fun] that coincided with multiple Stephen King sightings!). I got up and at it around 10 am, re-organizing the last realignment chapter. Previous four were economic, diplomatic, military and network. This one is the remainders-cum-summary that deals with demographics, the environment, social and spiritual matters. I simply call it the "social" realignment and leave it at that. As I noted earlier, I had anticipated doing a social-spiritual final realignment following a demographic-environmental one, but I decided to merge the two to make what I think will be a stronger narrative. So I had to rejigger the seven steps-descriptors a bit, but I'm very happy with the outcome.
Today I wrote just the first one--as is my custom on this book. Spent two hours assistant coaching a Little League practice where my younger, just-done-being-sick son plays. It means a lot to him so we make it happen. Still, having run as far as two miles with the young man, I feel his future lies in cross-country.
It was weird to restart writing after the layover. It was like pulling teeth, especially since I started at 1600 (way late for me). But I stuck with it over four hours and got my 12 paras as desired.
Tomorrow I hope to nail the 2nd through 4th sections, with the 5th through 7th following on Monday. I got my taxes all done on Friday to clear my sked through that date, because I have something to do at a military base on Tuesday and two later speeches near the end of the week (three in all, just like last week). After this week, one overseas speech prior to a family first communion, which is my hard target for first draft completion. Actually, I need to have it done well before then to make sure I can sufficiently clean the house for the relatives!
The book feels really settled, and as much as I've agonized in places, the whole thing has seemed a lot less painful than the previous two. Also, I find that I don't spend much time at all in this one on the inside-baseball stories (bragging to some, revealing to others). I find that the character and the vision are one; there's just no separating the two--different but quite enjoyable.
Side note, when in West Point I connected with one of Petraeus' famous brainiacs--Col. Michael Meese (son of more famous Ed). He came to the talk and we exchanged notes briefly afterwards. Compelling guy. Pleasure to finally meet him.
Anyway, total manuscript now sits at 157,816.
