This evening is the 150th anniversary of the first day of the Battle of Gettysburg. One Hundred Fifty years! Seems like such a long time. As I was doing touch up today on Myles Traveled, I thought back to an evening when my sons were little. We had traveled all day in the summer heat to Gettysburg, and in the cool of the evening watched a beautiful and peaceful sunset from Cemetery Ridge. Looking west over the quiet and pastoral rolling fields, into the golden sun sinking on the horizon, it was such a contrast to the carnage of Pickets Charge that will have occurred on that very same soil 150 years ago Wednesday. Yes, 150 years since General Lee retreated with a line of wounded reportedly 14 miles long. Yes, 150 years since nearly 50,000 causalities.

It seems like such a long time. But then I thought today, the story I am working on spans that same 150 years! The enormity of what I have been working on dawned on me. Myles Traveled starts on the slave auction block in those same 1860's. It is that same auction block we fought the war over. The same auction block that President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation over. And the same auction block whose demise was insured with the failure of Pickets Charge at the High Water Mark, at that simple grove of trees that still stands on the Gettysburg Battle Field marking the great dividing line in the history of this nation. If you've never been to Gettysburg you owe it to yourself. Put it on you bucket list.

While Myles Traveled and Gettysburg share a common timeline, I also thought today about the one way they are different. President Lincoln, in his address took 270 words and an envelope to tell the story of Gettysburg. I on the other hand, have needed more than 250,000 words and 400 pages to tell Myles Traveled. I thought about that a lot today as I did more pruning. Think I've got a few thousand more words to go!