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.
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.
The specific story line that people have responded to the most has been the horror of bathing suit shopping.
I'm more financially successful, but it just means the shopping blunders I make are bigger now.
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'd love to see more equal representation of female and male cartoonists on the comics page.
I never thought Cathy would get married in the comic strip. And I also thought I would never get married.
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.
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.
The specifics of Cathy's and my life are different now, but the basic life challenges are exactly the same.
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 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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
