Food, love, career, and mothers, the four major guilt groups.
Cathy Guisewite
Defy your own group. Rebel against yourself.
Generally, I liked feeling able to connect with millions of women on a very deep level. It felt special that women especially would cut out my strip and place it on a refrigerator.
Cartooning is a wonderful career, and I'd like more women to get to have it. I can't think of any reason why we won't see more syndicated female cartoonists in the future.
I'm most proud of having created something that men never completely get.
My mother had always taught me to write about my feelings instead of sharing really personal things with others, so I spent many evenings writing in my diary, eating everything in the kitchen and waiting for Mr. Wrong to call.
A young bride can put on makeup at 6 in the morning and look fabulous at midnight. I have about a 15-minute window where I actually look good, and then I have to wash my face and start over.
Imagine my surprise when, after a lifetime of teaching me to keep personal things to myself, Mom insisted my drawings were the start of a comic strip for millions of people to enjoy.
In 1976 I wrote a lot about women trying to claim the right to work.
The biggest change in my life is that I now have to apologize for being thin.
Because the majority of my readers are women, I feel that one public service I can provide to them is to spread the message of regular mammograms and early detection within the strip.
All parents believe their children can do the impossible. They thought it the minute we were born, and no matter how hard we've tried to prove them wrong, they all think it about us now. And the really annoying thing is, they're probably right.
Cathy was the first widely syndicated humor strip created by a woman. The strip was pretty revolutionary at the time not only because it starred a female, but also because it was so emotionally honest about all the conflicting feelings many women had in 1976.
Every time I get something under control in my own life, the world provides more material.
Mothers send strips to daughters to make a point. Daughters smack strips down on the breakfast table to make a point. My own mom sometimes cuts a strip out and sends it to me to make sure I understand her.
I wanted Cathy and Irving to actually say 'I do' and be pronounced husband and wife on Feb. 5, which is my mom's birthday.
I'm lucky that my real-life Mom has both a great sense of humor about herself and an amazing ability to slip into complete denial if the subject matter gets a little too close to home.
The specifics of Cathy's and my life are different now, but the basic life challenges are exactly the same.
I never thought Cathy would get married in the comic strip. And I also thought I would never get married.
The specific story line that people have responded to the most has been the horror of bathing suit shopping.
My dog was with me all the time. I talked to my dog. She was my best buddy. I shared all my secrets with her, but I don't think I every really tried jokes out with the dog.
The relationship between Cathy and Mom in the strip is the one relationship drawn from real life that I have proudly never even tried to disguise.
Animal welfare issues have always been important to me.
I'm more financially successful, but it just means the shopping blunders I make are bigger now.
I'm married, which means that instead of occasionally wondering about men from afar, I actually live with one and can be constantly astounded by the strange male brain.
Otherwise, my whole career has just been flinging myself at whatever is most overdue first and letting everything else stack up.
I have an office in my house and one about five minutes from my house. I worked solely out of my house for many years, but find, with children, that I have to be in a different ZIP code to think.
I'd love to see more equal representation of female and male cartoonists on the comics page.
I had such a close relationship with my dog, and my dog so filled the need in my life to have children that I just wanted Cathy to have that experience.
A lot of married people certainly have wonderful relationships with their dogs, but when you're single and your dog is the only other living thing in your house, it's a really special relationship which I wanted CATHY to have.
I wasn't intending to create a comic strip to begin with. So I think I wasn't aware that when the strip started, there had never been a woman's voice quite like this in the newspaper.
The best strips are the most honest. That's just the truth of it.
I love comics, and I can't imagine life without them. I love newspaper comics.
I never thought Cathy would get married in the comic strip. And I also thought I would never get married in real life. So both are shocks to me.
