How Editing is More than ‘For the Birds’

The saying, ‘for the birds’ genererally has a negative bent, but I’d like to give it a positive spin. Editing is often muddled up with mixed emotions—at times rewarding, and others frustrating—but as with any growth, at first you need the discomfort of discovering a change is needed. As a writer, this usually comes from hearing feedback on your work. You might think getting constructive criticism is ‘for the birds’ but this discomfort can lead to necessary improvements.

I’m taking inspiration from my daughter who has recently changed directions like a ‘boss’. Her aspiration was to become a pediatrician, until she embarked on a school trip and came home from this life altering experience to announce, “I hate chemistry. I don’t want to be a doctor.”

Embracing the need to edit her life path, she rearranged her entire schedule to take a Genesis course. In this course, the students learn about their world through a co-op experience, an environmental science, survival classes, hikes, camping, canoeing, and of all things, bird watching. 

Her teacher tasked them with capturing as many birds as possible in a bird watching app , offering up a highly sought after ‘toque’ as a prize for the student who catches the most birds (in truth, I think the bragging rights are likely worth more). Since the challenge was issued, my daughter has been rising with the sun, wrapping herself in a blanket, and plodding outdoors to bird hunt. Instead of her phone spewing TikTok noise litter, it is silent… capturing bird calls. 

On a recent hike, inspired to share, she thrust her binoculars at me and said, ‘Look. See him?”

I scanned the lake and marshy edges with my naked eye. Winter beaten cat tails stood starkly immobile, half naked, like tattered forgotten flags and then, marring the landscape, I noticed an incongruous dark shape.

At first, when I lifted the binoculars to my eyes, I was lost. The magnified world jarring and misplaced. I needed an anchor. I dropped the binoculars and looked again with my own eyes. Upon seeing the dark shadow, I lifted the binoculars and miraculously, a black feathered bird with shocking red tipped wings came into focus. 

The cool part was, once I knew what I was looking for, there were blackbirds everywhere!

This is the shock and joy of editing. We know mistakes are there in the pages, just like birds on the horizon in the marsh, but we can’t see them with our naked eye. Honing our editorial skills is much the same as learning to find new birds. You need to be open and to look.

Taking a wider appraisal of your novel can be like scanning a lake shore with your naked eye. On these passes, a writer can imagine the overall story arc, define bigger plot points, and the major beats. Then we need to focus closer into the pages to find grammatical errors, tense shifts, point of view slips, passive voice, and distancing filter words.

The beauty is when critique partners, beta readers and editors hand you the binoculars and you discover there are blackbirds everywhere in your writing!

Then you GASP as you realize how much work there is to be done. But don’t panic. You got this.

All you need is the desire to make the difference in your work and the willingness to look.

Set a goal and pick out a prize. Hell, buy yourself the toque. Put in on your desk and when you reach your goal – reward yourself.

Now, pick up those binoculars and off you go to edit your work.

Happy Birding!

P.S. The bird watching app I mentioned is free online from the Cornell Lab called Merlin. The link is embedded here. Enjoy!