The personal side of George W. Bush

WASHINGTON (AP) — President George W. Bush will be judged on what he did. He will also be remembered for what he’s like: a fast-moving, phrase-mangling Texan who stays upbeat even though his country is not.

For eight years, the nation has been led by a guy who relaxes by clearing brush in scorching heat and taking breakneck bike rides through the woods. He dishes out nicknames to world leavders, and even gave the German chancellor an impromptu, perhaps unwelcome, neck rub. He’s annoyed when kept waiting and sticks relentlessly to routine. He stays optimistic in even the most dire circumstances, but readily tears up in public. He has little use for looking within himself, and only lately has done much looking back.

Bush’s style and temperament are as much his legacy as his decisions. Policy shapes lives, but personality creates indelible memories — positive and negative.

Call it distinctly Bush.

Bush demands punctuality and disdains inefficiency. Every meeting better have a clear purpose. And it better not repeat what he already knows.

He is up early and in the Oval Office by 6:45 a.m. By 9:30 to 10 at night, it’s lights out. He likes to be fresh and won’t get cheated on his sleep.

In sessions with policy experts, Bush tends to ask questions that get right to the nub of a sticky issue. His top aides speak regretfully about how the country never got to see that side of him, even after all this time. They describe a man who is deeply inquisitive, not blithely incurious as much of the world thinks.

When Bush wants answers, guessing isn’t advised.

“He can sniff it out a mile away if you don’t have the goods,” said White House communications director Kevin Sullivan.

You can tell the issues that really get Bush going, because he talks about them differently, more passionately: education, AIDS relief, freedom. They happen to be ones that can be viewed more clearly through a moral lens. That’s how he sees the world.

Bush reads the Bible regularly. Another devotion: exercise. He makes time for a workout at least six days a week, wherever he is. And he goes at it hard, especially on his mountain bike on the weekends, when he pushes Secret Service agents to keep up with him. He is competitive and likes to stay in command.

The man from a land of cowboy boots orders proper dress in the White House. No jeans allowed in the West Wing. Coat and tie in the Oval Office.

And if you’re in Bush’s presence, turn off your cell phone. Pity the person who gets the Bush stare when a Blackberry rings at the wrong time.

Bush’s words betray him sometimes.

“They misunderestimated the compassion of our country,” Bush said of the Sept. 11 terrorists. “I talk to families who die,” he said, meaning the loved ones of those who perish in war.

Ivy League-educated, Bush is good-natured about his verbal trip-ups.

His tangled moments have undoubtedly helped shape an unflattering public perception. Invariably, though, people who talk to him privately — historians, journalists, dissidents — come away with a very different impression of a meticulous thinker.

Bush can flash a temper and impatience.

He is insistently — some say unforgivably — optimistic, no matter how low his poll numbers get.