Who Is Erma Bombeck?

I went to the Willamette Writer’s conference yesterday. Boy what fun! Except for one part, I had a fantastic day. I got to be with my friends from my writing group, all of whom are successfully doing great writing, getting published, getting awards, and getting better looking all the time. It’s true.

The one exception was my “pitch” meeting with an agent who was 14 years old. He was so young his diaper was hanging out of his pants leg. He was so young, he still had a placenta. He was so young, ah heck, you get the picture and I can’t waste time making up lame jokes because I just googled “he was so young” and there aren’t any on the internet I can steal. But this guy, who, in his bio said he handled “humor,” this guy had never heard of (gasp) Erma Bombeck. Oh my gosh. I know there are people from back in the day who the young folks haven’t heard of, but how can you be an agent who promotes authors who write humor without knowing something about humor legends?

I am not going to go off on this guy here. Well, yeah I am. When I was young, of course I knew all the bands/writers/politicians from my time period, but I knew previous ones too, if for no other reason than to make jokes about them. If all I had in my stable of knowledge was what was occurring right this minute or in the last few years, I would have been a pretty dull person. I was pretty, but I was not dull. Well, actually I was cute. That’s what everyone always said, “Suzanne is so cute.” Strangers used to come up and pinch my cheek. “You’re so CUTE” like they’d do to a baby. I’d bite them. If you see someone with a missing index finger, now you know why.

My high school daughter and her friends know the words to all the old songs. It’s crazy. If I drive them somewhere and a song from the 70’s comes on, and they all sing it. “How do you know the words to that song?” I ask, and they ignore me, as usual, so I don’t know how they know, but they do.

So this agent had never heard of the woman who wrote a syndicated humor column read by millions, who wrote several best-selling books, who was a speaker all over the world, who was on TV and at the White House, and who was a champion of women, a household name, and still has such a following that the Erma Bombeck Writer’s Workshop sells out every year. A great resource for humor writers is a website dedicated to her, www.humorwriters.org (where you can register for the Workshop, see a picture of Erma, and learn about her funny life on the YouTube video there). Here are some of her quotes that I snagged off the website in case you don’t bother going there. Never heard of Erma Bombeck…what is this world coming to?

"Insanity is hereditary. You can catch it from your kids."

"My second favorite household chore is ironing. My first one being hitting my head on the top bunk bed until I faint."

"There's nothing sadder in this world than to awake Christmas morning and not be a child."

"The only reason I would take up jogging is so I could hear heavy breathing again."

"Laughter rises out of tragedy, when you need it the most, and rewards you for your courage."

"In general, my children refused to eat anything that hadn't danced on TV."

"When humor goes, there goes civilization."

"Seize the moment. Think of all those women on the 'Titanic' who waved off the dessert cart."

"Never loan your car to anyone to whom you've given birth."

"The grass is always greener over the septic tank."

"A child needs your love more when he deserves it least."

"There is a thin line that separates laughter and pain, comedy and tragedy, humor and hurt."

"It takes a lot of courage to show your dreams to someone else."

"If you can laugh at it, you can live with it."