EXIT ONLY by TERRY MAROTTA

What ELSE do I do?

I write books, collections of short funny pieces.

A lady once emailed me to say she started laughing so hard reading one piece that the coffee she was drinking shot out her nose and across the kitchen table.

That was “I Thought He Was a Speed Bump” which has 50 three-page chapters and is largely about life with children. It has words like ‘penis’ and ‘bum-bum’ in it so Fourth Graders find it hilarious, though older people like it too. “When will DAD become a woman?” my six-year-old old asked on hearing about the Great Baby Mystery. “Thy Kingdom Come I will be Dumb” gravely prayed my 4-year-old one day after church. It’s all here, all fun all the time except for the chapters that make you cry.

“Vacationing in My Driveway” with its equally short tales chapters was my second book. It goes week by week through the year and is funny too – plus it has a little death in it; is full of reverence as well as amusing anecdotes. Is in part it is partly testimony to the shining truth that there is always renewal after loss, always new growth in the seared heart, always a spring that follows the winter. As it title suggests it’s all for having fun and staying grateful wherever you happen to be.

My most recent two books are audio books, to make you laugh in the car.

The one called “Still Following The Trail Of Breadcrumbs” comes with a pretty little print manual which together with the three CDs teach people how to do what I do for a living as a newspaper columnist because what’s nicer than that? Capturing an experience in print? Just setting it down to savor later?

And finally “All Beautiful” is BRAND-new, a collection of 52 pieces I have read on Public Radio over the years, all recorded again by me in running shorts and a sports bra during the hottest days of last summer in the back bedroom that used to be our son’s. Gifted genies at a recording studio out west ironed out all the hiccups and stuck in some seriously beautiful music. I sometime I think it’s my favorite, although I tend to think every book is my favorite when I’m just done making it.

But really? Really this blog is really my favorite because I get to write every day if I like. I’ve been doing it for almost a year now and I have to say: I haven’t been this happy since I was six myself and following my mom and my aunt and those two ancient toddling great-aunts around the house all day talking my head off as they listened and listened with their humorous, much-missed loving smiles.