When I was a little girl, I loved the sound of my mother’s laughter.  She’d snicker when the dog came home with every newspaper on our block, giggle kindly at Dad’s corny puns, and chuckle proudly at my brother’s pre-teen jokes.  Sometimes she’d howl with best friend, Aunt Peg while reminiscing about a Lucy and Ethel moment. But it was in the afternoon, when Mom finally sat down to read the paper with her Tab and a Camel, that I’d hear the gales of laughter that meant  it was an Erma day.

Erma Bombeck was the original Mommy Blogger.  With her syndicated column, At Wit’s End, she chronicled the ordinary life of a suburban housewife.   Erma’s self-deprecating humor resonated well with her peers, and gave them a rare but welcome opportunity to laugh at their husbands, their children, their mothers, and themselves.

While I sure as hell didn’t want her name, I did want Erma’s wit. Making people laugh the way my mom laughed, sounded both magical and medicinal.

Two decades later it was just a fluke that I discovered my latent sense of humor.  Unlike my joker of a husband, or comedian of a son, coming up with quick, sassy, johnny-on-the-spot responses, has never been my forte. But 18 years ago, when the reality of four kids and a workaholic husband put an unexpected damper on my Christmas spirit and made holiday cards a farcical fantasy, I began writing the yearly Christmas letter.

And Baby Makes Six

My mom always warned me to: “never say never” and, in that maddening way that mothers seem to have, she was oh, so right.  I said I’d never give my baby a pacifier, never drink before dusk, never go to bed mad, never go through another labor, and never write one of these cop-out Christmas letters.  But let’s face it, when you’re young, you’re smug …and when you’re mother to four kids under six, you’re toast.

The first year set the standard.  After my husband initially balked at my honesty “what do you mean, you go to bed mad??” and I refused to back down, he soon jumped on board as editor-in-chief and earned my undying respect the year he began telling it like it was himself …” I’ll give you a quarter, if you bring me a Bud without shaking it.”

I first learned the power of telling it like it is back in middle school after an oreo-binge confession brought me more friends in an hour than during ten years I’d spent pretending to be perfect. Even then, when most of us jockeyed for position with the popular crowd by posturing as self-assured, underneath it all, everyone ached to not be the only one who overdosed on Oreos.

Mommy bloggers have the right idea. Sharing the dementia of early motherhood and the demands of activities as exotic as properly acknowledging a toddler’s proud comparison of her poop to a shark… helps make motherhood a hell of a lot more bearable.  Now, instead of blowing up when the kids are sick, the DVD player’s shot, the husband’s traveling, and your roots are growing in…moms can read, or write about it and – poof! – all is well, or at least a LOT  better. That’s what good ole Erma did for moms 35+years ago.

No matter how tired, angry, sad, burdened, or overwhelmed I am, sharing the human experience with like-minded folks was always as close to a cure-all as I’d ever found.

But after a rough patch this time last year, I became too tired, angry, sad, burdened and overwhelmed to believe there even were like-minded folks…so I took an extended sabbatical; but 2013 is a new year, and I’m ready to write again.

21 22 Years of Plan B is what I’ve long referred to as my book in “blogress” and after a year filled with thumb-sucking, soul-searching, knitting, snoozing, beading, sewing, cooking, boozing, wedding-planning, procrastinating, meditating, painting, reading, cleaning, boo-hooing, dog-walking, volunteering, and doing pretty much everything but writing…I am about to re-embark on my blog journey.

I hope you’ll come along for the ride.  Whether you opt to subscribe or not, I’d be eternally grateful if you’d hop over to my Facebook give it a like.

Many Thanks and Welcome to Plan B.