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Fast forward a generation or two and the women writing about writing and mothering are young enough to be Jean's and Erma's and Shirley's daughters and granddaughters. Although many things have changed for women in the past sixty years, the domestic humorist's goal is the same as it's always been: find something to laugh about and then find the time and energy to write it down. Comparisons are inevitable, however, and the void left when Erma Bombeck died in 1996 has inspired many a back-of-the-book blurb writer to proclaim discovery of her successor. Whether the writers themselves are hoping to be the next Erma Bombeck is anyone's guess, but obviously every publisher wants to grab the market share that Erma left behind. I think it's time for a new lingo to describe the mother/writer; since reviewers and publishers are mired in these comparisons, we'll make it official: She's a bombeckian writer, she bombecks a weekly column, her first erma will be published in the spring. Comparisons to Erma notwithstanding, each of these writers has staked a claim to her own "motherhood with humor" territory. Judy Gruen The Los Angeles Times claims that Judy Gruen has "the same wacky touch as Erma Bombeck," and her book, Carpool Tunnel Syndrome is heralded as a laugh-out-loud classic. Although the book certainly has funny passages, I found Judy's tone to be a bit too self-righteous for me. I don't mind some well-placed righteous indignation, but Judy doesn't climb on the same soapboxes as I do, and when she starts ranting, I feel like one of the mothers she'd probably disapprove of, which isn't all that funny to me. However, I can imagine that there are plenty of mothers out there who would feel vindicated, and get a good laugh. In the first chapter, she advocates licenses for motherhood: "Even the Third World emigre whose name you are trying to read while getting vertigo while he hurtles you round the streets of New York City has a license number. But when was the last time you were in a regular Mom's kitchen and saw on her refrigerator, next to little Montana's drawing of her house and a smiley-face sun, a framed official document indicating that Mom was duly licensed in her state to practice the ancient, at one time revered, art and science of motherhood? Because it smacks of communism, no one has dared try promulgating any form of minimum competency standards for motherhood, which may explain such phenomena as girls named Moonbeam and 3-year-old boys with earrings and haircuts with a spermlike tail in the back." Judy is much funnier when she gets off her high horse and complains about, for instance, her kids, her carpool, or her lack of organization. Ayun Halliday In the about-the-author blurb on Ayun Halliday's The Big Rumpus: A Mother's Tales From the Trenches she's called "a new generation's urban Bombeck," (groan) but if I was forced to compare her to another writer I would say she's Shirley Jackson's heir apparent. Writing about childbirth, the neonatal ICU, or breastfeeding on the subway, Ayun's stories are long and rambling, full of dead-on observations and well-drawn memories along with political commentary, musings about contemporary culture and funny anecdotes about the main features: Ayun's children Inky and Milo. Ayun is the creator of The East Village Inky, a 'zine that she started in a moment of creative desperation: "I'd always wanted to start a zine. I just couldn't seem to come up with a compelling subject. To put out a zine, you have to find a sustainable passion, something that will drive you to create issue after issue, stapling them together long after everyone else in your house has gone to bed. It wasn't until my daughter Inky turned one that I realized that I has something to write about after all. Why, I was no different from Judy Garland in "The Wizard of Oz"! The thing I'd gone looking for was right in my own backyard, except that I didn't have a backyard; I had a rusty fire escape that I was afraid to sit on with a baby. I could write about that!" And so she has, amusing her readers with the never-ending saga of life with two small children, and puddles of pee on the floor: "I'll long for the old burdens when Inky and Milo are sneaking out the window to swap bodily fluids with their friends. Right now they just lick each other's spill-proof cups and prevent me from writing the Great American Novel." Anne Lamott I haven't found a single reviewer who compares Anne Lamott's Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year to anything by Erma, but this book definitely belongs on this list. Anne Lamott (someone should call her a Californian Erma Bombeck) is funny and honest -- about being a thirty-five year-old single mother, a recovering alcoholic and drug addict, a Christian, and a damned good writer. I first read this book when I was about six months into the mothering business; my husband and I can still recite from memory most of this passage that we read aloud to all our friends: "The worst thing, worse even than sitting around crying about that inevitable day when my son will leave for college, worse than thinking about whether or not in the meantime to get him those hideous baby shots that he probably should have but that some babies die from, worse than the fears I have when I lie awake a 3:00 in the morning (that I won't make enough money and will have to live in a tenement house where the rats will bite our heads while we sleep, or that I will lose my arms in some tragic accident and will have to go to court and diaper my son using only my mouth and feet and the judge won't think I've done a good enough job and will put Sam in a foster home), worse than even the fear I feel whenever a car full of teenagers drives past my house going 200 miles an our on our sleepy little street, worse than thinking about my son being run over by one of those drunken teenagers, or of his one day becoming one of those drunken teenagers -- worse than just about anything else is the agonizing issue of how on earth can anyone bring a child into this world knowing full well that he or she is eventually going to have to go through the seventh and eighth grades." Amy Krouse Rosenthal I know you can't judge a book by its title, but if you could, this one would have my vote: The Same Phrase Describes My Marriage and My Breasts: Before the Kids, They Used to Be Such a Cute Couple. Some of the pieces in this collection border on being too cute, but I appreciate Amy's lighthearted take on mothering -- there's not much angst here, but that can be a relief. Amy is funny and endearing, and she writes in small doses in the hope that new parents will be able to "finish an entire piece or two, without falling asleep in the middle of a sen" She writes ("with wit reminiscent of the late Erma Bombeck") about picky eaters, kids who don't nap when you need them to, and going to McDonald's. I love her suggestions for new McDonald's Happy Meals, such as "Happy Before My Brother Was Born Meals", "Unhappy And Whiney Because I Didn't Take A Nap Today Meals", and "You Broke Your Sister's Hercules Toy Now Are You Happy? Meals." Sandi Kahn Shelton You Might as Well Laugh: Surviving the Joys of Parenthood is a collection of Sandi Kahn Shelton's columns and essays from her weekly humor column for the New Haven Register and her "Wit's End" column in WorkingMother magazine, whose editor calls Sandi "the true successor to Erma Bombeck's throne." (Move over all you imposters!) This book really makes me laugh, so much that I can overlook the blurb by Bil Keane on the front cover (he's thankful that someone's a writer and not a cartoonist; me, I'd be thankful if I never saw another "Family Circus" cartoon. Whoever thought that Bil Keane's opinion would sway the reading public?) I'll assume that the blurbs aren't her fault -- it's what's inside that counts, and her chronicles of life with Ben and Allie (who are pre-teens, teens, then college students) and little Stephanie (baby, toddler, precocious pre-schooler) are very funny. Sandi is a pleasantly self-effacing mother -- she's the first to tell you that she doesn't have the instinct to put a baby in a crib and leave the room and have it fall asleep, like some people do. "Those people live in a quieter and simpler universe than the rest of us," she writes. "As for me, I am writing this column with a 4-week-old baby strapped to the front of me. And, yes, thank you, she is finally asleep." Sleep, or lack thereof, is a recurring theme in Sandi's books and she has many a harrowing tale about random no-sleep nights and small children who bring large toys into their parents' bed. She also tells the truth about working at home, where there are many distractions including neglected bathtubs, and worse, children: "It's just that when I'm in the middle of a major telephone call actually having to do with work that my door bursts open and I am asked by my 5-year-old to judge which piece of cheese is larger than the other. She would love to tell the whole tragic story, which apparently involves someone trying to foist on her an inferior-sized bit of cheese compared to what her friend was given. But I give her my fiercest look. I am, after all, working. But then, while I am talking on the phone, I get the calipers out, measure the cheeses and point to the bigger piece. That's what the magazines don't tell you. You can work at home, but only if you don't mind a dirty tub and you keep a pair of calipers handy." Sleeping Through the Night and Other Lies is Sandi's version of a new-parenting advice manual, except that it gives you advice a new mama could really use, doled out in manageable doses, including: "Actual known advantages to having an infant -- for those days when you can't remember," "Why you will never again be anywhere on time," "Faking the baby book," and my favorite, "Get over the sanctity-of-the-marriage-bed thing."
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