A “Heap o’ Nothin’” or a “Pile of Somthin’”

Who but Florence King would write a column and entitle it “Heap o’ Nothin’?” The piece in question appears in the “National Review” in the August 30, 2010 issue on page 39, in her regular column, The Bent Pin. You do subscribe to “National Review” don’t you? Her column alone is worth the price of admission. Enjoying the cream of conservative writers, Ms. King stands alone among the contributors. She has a salty style which is otherwise unavailable. No doubt, this was acquired growing up in the south in the thirties and forties.

As an example, I submit the following:

“They don’t call him “No Drama Obama” for nothing. He’s even worse than we thought because he has committed the ultimate American crime, worse than anything he has been accused of so far. He has no sense of humor. You can tell just by watching him at the mike that here is a person who knows the words but not the tune. You see him standing like a greyhound in the slips, straining upon the start, but he can’t sense where the start comes. Someone has over-coached him on the subject of “timing.” He doesn’t really feel it, he just knows that comedians are supposed to have something called timing, so he puts on a little half-smile and waits for it—you can almost hear him counting.

My ultimate prediction is based on the scientific certainty of female intuition. I have a feeling that a lot is going to happen. I sense that something is gearing up, gathering speed, starting to peek from behind the curtain. Lights keep going off in my mind like fireflies in a jar, and I already have a poem to go with it all: “Shine, Perishing Republic” by Robinson Jeffers.”

To read what came before and to complete what follows you will have to borrow a copy from your well-informed brother-in-law and finish it yourself. I imagine that National Review would be touchy if I quoted the entire thing.

As a geezer, I may have a greater appreciation of Florence King and an admiration for that segment of our society who don’t bother mincing words. We plainly don’t have enough time in life left to waste on platitudes and “the little niceties.”

In His abiding love,

Cecil Moon