I don’t boost other peoples’ blogs. I have been known to recognize a colleague who feeds me good copy (hi, Mr Reilly), but the attribution is there every time. But today I break with precedent, because the topic is important and close to home.

One of my nearest and dearest is on leave from a Big Four and in a tough fight. Depression and mental health are topics we avoid, lest anyone should doubt our omniscience and have-it-all image. After all, we are the tax gurus, right? We are the ones who deal with The Phone Call, the three a.m. OMG did I (do)(not do) thats, the clients facing disaster (losing their heads and blaming it on you), and all that jazz.

Except.

As I said in my blogpost “NOL A Nullity,” 2/27/12, “I can understand anyone being acutely anxious about taxes, even a CPA like J.” (Name omitted). Especially.

I can’t think anyone reading this my blog is reading it for fun. It’s not written to amuse or divert. I am writing for the in-the-trenches practitioner who needs to know what is going on, the grunt about to deploy from the chopper into what may be a firefight and needs some idea about what is going down at the Glasshouse on Second Street, N.W.

Fast.

And s/he can’t show indecision, fear, or the slightest doubt that, whatever the problem, s/he’ll fix it fast and cheap.

I submit, with all due deference and respect, that ain’t the way it is. The great French actress Sarah Bernhardt put it best: When a young actress joined the Comédie Francaise and boasted that she didn’t know what stage fright was, Bernhardt shot back “Wait until you get to be good, my girl, then you’ll know.”

I further submit that the best way to deal with the killer stress we all face is to talk about. Honestly.

My baby is trying. Follow her blog “Seriously, Jerkbrain?” on WordPress.