I’m afraid you are right.

You know, when I got cancer, I made my peace with everybody I could reach who I might have gotten crosswise with for no good reason. Looking at that enterprise, and at who came to visit me in the hospital, I came to feel I was ready to go if things did not fall my way. My only regret was I did not get a memoir done to encourage kids like I was, who could not deal with the public schools.

When I got out of the hospital, I engaged in a race with my own mortality to finish that memoir. I won the race. It will be out this year from Miniver Press.

But now, I find myself really wanting to live long enough to see my country pull through this — as you so aptly put it — stress test. I know it sounds like I keep moving the goalposts because I’m afraid to die, but, while dying is nothing I’m looking forward to experiencing, it really is that I am rooting for democracy. I want to see the outcome, even if it’s not the outcome I would choose. And if there’s anything I can write to tip the scales in favor of bottom up government rather than top down, that would be a pleasure.