The first time

I haven't learnt anything new, any new parts, for several weeks. The same parts, repeated time & time again. Stopping to correct bits, work on them. Slowing them right down and counting to 12. making sure I've got each of the 11 falsettas spot on. Knowing when they come on 11 and when they come in on 12. And of course when they come in on 1. Or on the and. I have a crib sheet to make sure I am keeping to the right structure, the right order. From the top...
All the way through.
Then once again going back over the bits when it didn't quite happen, it didn't quite feel right. Nothing new. That's important. That's how you internalise it. That's how you begin to really get to grips with a specific part, a specific falsetta. Am I playing each not well, cleanly. Am I play it in exactly the right place. Now once I've done that can I give it something extra, can I make it rock, can I make it swing?
Then recount again if I need to.
Repeated every time I pick up the guitar. For several weeks. Sometimes playing for two or three hours a night.
My thumb nail breaks. Shit. I have to get the nail file out quickly to save it. There's plenty left, a good four millimetres. But not really enough to play it properly, especially on the alzapua thumb strum.
But I keep playing, repeating the falsetta that's all thumb because it isn't quite right. I start to get a blister on my thumb, the skin then hardens, it begins to catch a little. Another five days before my next lesson: let's hope it's grown back enough to play cleanly.
I keep playing. Go away to mates for a night so end up having to play his steel stung guitar, which is almost like playing another instrument nowadays. (Even though that's all I played for years.)
Then the lesson. We do the warm up techniques. And talk to much, as ever. Discuss the way that the Beatles used so many treble - as opposed to bass - runs. Then Bulerias. I play a few notes of the tricky falsetta to know I've got the right tempo for me. (A good tip to anyone.) Not too fast. Or indeed not too slow. (You can stumble just as much when it's slow.)
The go.
With the crib sheet for the first time. So I don't have to stress about what comes next, just focus on playing. (Another good tip. For free...)
11 falsettas later I get to the end.
And look up. ( I never look up when I'm playing in a lesson. It's too.... presumptuous?)
The man from Del Monte, he say:
"Great. Really good. Now (at last, he meant) we're beginning to play well..."

Hallelujah