Bachelor of Science in Biology. Swell! What was I thinking, majoring in that field when all I ever loved about it was the roll of organisms’ scientific names in my tongue, being Latin… now, that’s Languages. The course was way off the road to the career I want so much to pursue.

It is never too late to change course and find the right track. When you spent most of your life eye-ing something far out of your reach, you will eventually get there. Time and money-wise, I still cannot afford the formal study. I am a poor earthling, sweetie, but richly blessed. The One-Up-There keeps dropping angels on my big lap. Angels bearing on-the-job-training for me; presenting me huge opportunities to hone my skills in the profession I want to be in. My writing tools are ready; the ones Ms lovelydia suggested are on my toplist to purchase next.

On my first few attempts at editing, I felt unsure and guilty messing up with somebody’s written thoughts. When I got the gist of it, I turned keyboard-happy –prune here, trim this, cut that off, plant some words here, chop these! I am unforgiving and ruthless, and I am deriving such pleasure from it A blast! This must be how a pig feels when wallowing in mud –the dirtier it gets, the happier it is. The more disorganized, incomprehensible, and incongruous letters, words, and sentences are; the higher the level of excitement.

What makes it doubly joyful is, I have an accomplice –in tampering, he he! I am sooo honored when she called me “partner”. One word, overwhelms me. See the power of words? Partner make me feel sooo high, I feel I sprouted wings! Wow, angel na bigla aketch, mamu… isang pilyang baklang anghel! SweeTeacher said we’re equals, isang paligo @ occasional p… lang ang lamang niya sa akin. Pssst, pardner, equal din tayo dyan, ‘lam mo po ba?:) Abu talaga kita, to the max!

The real challenge lies in the seemingly perfect writings. You become entranced by the power and beauty of the words that you tend to overlook the imperfections. The tiny errors, missing punctuation marks, awkward words, and occasional disorganization of sentences; all these things you see upon focused and closer scrutiny; deeper analysis. And you work on polishing them. While you’re doing so, you’re learning BIG time, and so with the one who penned the writing you’ve put your heart and soul to work on. Editor and writer improving their crafts.

It is akin to life. I am open to close scrutiny by the selected few, makes me see the dirt on my face… and I will act on it; grateful for the one who held the mirror for me. I can edit bits of my present life but not the whole of it, and never the past. By golly, that’s silly! Scrap the past. I defied Kim’s Law somewhere on this page. Now, be kind enough and show me faults you see on the piece. Be quick, before I turn into a critic’s ass-chewing witch!

I am an apprentice. My great sweeTeacher on Editorial 101 gave me a list of rules, which is growing each time there is a new “candy” (article). I refer to it as Kim’s Law. When I am working on a piece of somebody’s writing, I am in a garden of words, walking in the writer’s shoes. When I stumble on thorny weeds and loopy vines, sweeTeacher will leave me bleeding to figure out how to untangle myself. Tough teaching method. (Just a scrape, anyway.) But a soft heart, hands over a first aid kit while pointing out other unseen and tiny, easy-to-miss spots that ruin the beauty of the garden –the allergens creating the itchy feeling that something is amiss…

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