Person: Erma Bombeck
The book's title demonstrates Erma's connection and empathy for real women. Uploaded by ecx.images-amazon.com.
Imagine writing more than 4,000 newspaper columns over three decades. Could you make each one great, funny, touching, memorable? I couldn’t. Most people couldn’t. But somehow, Erma Bombeck did.
Erma was writing for her hometown paper in Dayton, Ohio, when her editor sent some of her columns to the Newsday Newspaper Syndicate. They loved “At Wit’s End,” and within a few years it appeared in more than 900 newspapers nationwide.
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Erma wrote about the daily lives of real women, gently poking fun while always displaying empathy. After all, that was her life. She was the mother of two, the wife of a teacher, the resident of suburbia.
She wrote thirteen books, most compendiums of her columns, most bestsellers. We couldn’t cover this wonderful woman without remembering some of her famous lines:
“Did you ever notice that the first piece of luggage on the carousel never belongs to anyone?”
“God created man, but I could do better.”
“I’ve exercised with women so thin that buzzards followed them to their cars.”
“Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died.”
“The only reason I would take up jogging is so that I could hear heavy breathing again.”
“Who in their infinite wisdom decreed that Little League uniforms be white? Certainly not a mother.”
“Have you any idea how many children it takes to turn off one light in the kitchen? Three. It takes one to say, ‘What light?’ and two more to say, ‘I didn’t turn it on.'”
“When your mother asks, ‘Do you want a piece of advice?’ it is a mere formality. It doesn’t matter if you answer yes or no. You’re going to get it anyway.”
“In two decades I’ve lost a total of 789 pounds. I should be hanging from a charm bracelet.”