How did Erma do it?

Hi,
Erma Bombeck was my favorite columnist. She appeared in the Toronto Star, Monday through Friday, and I was her most avid reader. She always had something to say. How did she do it? Every day there were another 800 words (I'm guessing, I never counted) of wisdom, humor, insight, silliness, laughter and tears. I got to know her family in that piece of paper, no ones secrets were safe. Many times I was glad it was her daughter, and not me, having their school grades or love life talked about in national syndication. I wonder what her kids are doing now? I miss her. Dear Abby and Anne Landers doled out info but it was never as intimate or personal as Erma. Erma made you feel like she just dropped in for tea and wanted to chat for a minute before having to go to a load of laundry or rescue the dog again. I wanted a best friend like her.

This brings me to why I'm thinking about Erma Bombeck today. I blog, but not religiously. I don't feel like I have the voice needed to do this job every day. I sure can be loud when I want to be, but do I have to add to the noise all the time? Our Uncle Alec was the quietest man I ever met. I used to think he only knew how to whisper, but when he spoke everyone in the family got quite so they could hear him. Maybe I should have learned to whisper. Filling my blog feels good to me, but does anyone listen? Erma was the original blogger to me. She never seemed to shout but millions of her readers heard her voice daily. I am so jealous of her ability to hold everyones' attention for 3 minutes. Today you can stand naked in Times Square and no one will notice. Ask the Naked Cowboy who does it every day. He admits that he's become almost invisible to New Yorkers. The only people who pay attention to him singing in a Stetson and boots, and nothing else, are the occasional tourist... and even they aren't terribly fazed. What's a person have to do these days to get an audience? I shudder to think.

So I blog. I type. I wax poetic, or not. Does it get read? I have no idea. Sometimes people I know will comment in passing but most of the time I have no clue if I am being heard at all. I wonder if Erma ever thought about the sound she made. Was it loud or soft? I know she had 'fan mail' that would pour in when she would comment on something that would get her readerships' attention. She then would turn that into her next column. Maybe it's that part of the dialogue that is missing with a blog. I understand why comedians need the instant laughter of the audience. Without it, you never know if anyone is listening or not.

xox
m

Freckles

Hi,
meet Freckles. He's our new tenant. He thinks he owns the place but that is yet to be determined.

Freckles moved in this spring, lock stock and barrel. He has his lily pad all decked out in the latest fashion from Target, including his IPod dock and gamer chair. He thinks he's cool. He's also on Facebook, Twitter and Match.com. He's looking for a babe to share his pad with. How do we know that? You have to hear his mating call, it's pretty amazing. The whole house shakes when he bellows. At first we thought it was a minor earthquake, but it turns out to just be Freckles stretching his vocal chords. What a dude.

I've had to lay down some rules about his tenancy. No late night parties. Take out your own trash. No new holes in the rocks. That sort of thing. His only truly annoying habbit isn't smoking, it's scaring the crap out of me when I walk near the pond. He hides in the flower bed and springs at me. He can jump almost up to my nose. Our new arrangement is that I whistle when I walk around the pond. He either thinks I'm calling him or he hates the sound, either way he gets his ass back in the water pretty quick and checks out the real estate on the bottom of the pool. I no longer run the risk of landing in the muck or on my ass when he tries to startle me. It's working itself out.

Since I can't get him to pay rent, we've worked out an agreement in trade. Freckles is in charge of bug control. I think it's only fair that he pulls his weight, and it is conciderable heft. He's as big as my whole hand out-stretched. No free ride on this lily pad, no sir-ree-bob. He also has minor guard duties at night. Who needs a dog or an alarm when you have a killer frog on patrol. I think we may start a trend in the neighbourhood. 

We would like to welcome Freckles to the block. We hope he becomes a member in good standing and over time, learns to play nice with everyone. No scaring the owners of the house by pouncing in their face. Is that too much to ask? Ribbit.

xox
m