We use the phrase ‘life is just a bowl of cherries‘ (the word just is optional) is used to mean that everything is going well and life is full of pleasure and joy. Cherries are certainly a tasty treat but there is no particular reason why cherries were chosen for this simile instead of any other fruit. Life is a bowl of cherries comes from the title of a popular song.
Origin of ‘Life is (Just) a Bowl of Cherries’
A song written by Ray Henderson (music), Buddy G. DeSylva and Lew Brown (lyrics) is the origin of this saying. Ethel Merman introduced this song in George White’s Scandals in 1931. Rudy Vallée also recorded a version of the song that same year which spent five weeks as a top ten hit. The song was later revived, in 1953, by Jaye P. Morgan.
An alternative version of ‘life is a bowl of cherries’ is life is a bowl of pits, expressing the opposite idea.
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