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By Teri Rizvi

One writer likened the virtual Erma Bombeck Writers' Workshop to "a working cruise ship sans the pool and deck."

Another felt "LOL aftershocks," and one quipped that she did not want the virtual belly laughs to subside. "Are they going to make us leave when this ends? I'm not leaving. I'm not moving from here until the next Erma Bombeckalooza or maybe not forever," she said.

When a global pandemic forced me to reschedule the spring workshop for the fall and then swallow my apprehension and take the event online, I did not envision nearly 700 writers from around the world, in the zany spirit of the conference, camped out at their laptops, more than a few in pajamas, bathrobes, Halloween masks and the occasional tiara.

Wearing an aged robe with a surgical mask looped over her ear, longtime emcee Patricia Wynn Brown, a professional performer with pitch perfect comedic timing, set the tone in an opening monologue from her basement laundry room in Columbus, Ohio.

"Right now we can use a boost. We can take a page from Aunt Erma’s Cope Book. WWEW — What would Erma want? She'd want us to buck up, slip on our MuuMuus, put on our Sansabelt pants, throw in a load, sit in our easy chair and drink our favorite beverage,” said the unflappable Brown. "Onward and upward, Erma Nation."

Humor saves us, and we had gathered across time zones to be restored. "We're taking a small, but needed, detour from this moment in the world to do some mining of comedy and refreshing of the human spirit," reflected New York Times’ bestselling author Annabelle Gurwitch from her Los Angeles study. Earlier, Mike Rowe of “Dirty Jobs” fame quipped, "I don’t fully understand what goes on at this bacchanalia, but I like it."

As the virtual workshop came to life on my computer screen, I realized I had underestimated the hunger of writers for connection and the power of laughter to heal. "We are conjuring,” emcee Brown observed, "the magic of hope, renewal, inspiration and joy."

At times, the weekend felt like group therapy session, a readymade support system after a year of quarantines, travel curtailment, a worsening pandemic and the greatest civil unrest since the 1960s.

The chat bar sped by with colorful comments and quips. Writers on the West coast set their alarms to catch the 6 a.m. sessions live instead of watching the recordings later. "I haven't run to the refrigerator once, the true mark of audience engagement," noted syndicated columnist Suzette Martinez Standring. One thread wove throughout this gathering of witty wordsmiths. Can we find words of humor and hope for healing not just ourselves, but a broken world?

"Your writing is your higher calling. It is the thing you MUST be doing when the world seems to be falling apart because that may be the thing that helps the world stay together in ways you can't even imagine," said novelist and essayist Sophfronia Scott in a poignant keynote rallying cry.

"What if this is your opportunity to speak comfort to someone with the same sense of one-on-one intimacy that you and I have right now?" she asked. "The Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison said, ‘This is precisely the time when artists go to work. There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.'"

As Sophfronia's words hung in the air, I heard the echo of humor icon Erma Bombeck. "When humor goes," she wrote, "there goes civilization."

Humor saves us. It connects us. Its heart beats with hope.

"To connect is the highest aspiration for humans," keynoter Gurwitch told writers. "I think that's what great writing does, whether it's writing on the page or writing on the stage in the form of a joke. It compresses the space between our lives."

Even when life is no laughing matter, "the world needs you to write your heart out," urged keynoter and stand-up comic Wendy Liebman.

"Write, Ermas, write — and do not waste time."

— Teri Rizvi

Teri Rizvi is the founder and director of the Erma Bombeck Writers' Workshop at the University of Dayton, where she serves as executive director of strategic communications.

(Photo credit: Jess Witkins. It's not too late to register for the virtual workshop. All the keynotes and workshops will be accessible to writers through the end of 2021. Cost: $99.)