Muddling By – Fourth Draft Finished

Just a quick post, partly so I can chronicle my process for myself. The fourth draft of Muddling By is done! But that’s because I scaled back my goal for this draft to cleaning up some simple edits and logic holes. I decided to add another full edit to my draft publishing schedule because I will use a different editing approach for the next draft. The fourth draft was intended to include more emotion, but as I edited it I realized the emotional edit should get individual attention. Mixing the factual and the anecdotal with the emotional was too high of an expectation. If someone read it now, it would read like a book; but I want the reader to feel the impact of the topics in ways that go beyond the objective and clinical. 

• First, I already sent out backup copies.
• Beginning now, a short celebration, which so far includes a cup of tea and a cookie.
• Third, Respect summer! and get out there for a week with bicycle rides, hikes, dancing, and sleeping in.
• Fourth, back to it.

The goal remains the same: finish before 2026 and while the US is still united.