The Heap

 It was one of those constant annoyances. Well, maybe not an annoyance.  Maybe it was just something always in view, something that arrested one's attention, interrupted one's focus, at an age when focus was neither easily obtained nor retained.
   It was a file. No, not a file. It was a stack. But no, files and stacks imply order,and this had none. Nothing discernible,anyway.
   In truth, it was really a pile, a heap. It was stuff to be saved,  a heap of newspapers, magazines,clippings, and notes. But no matchbooks,such as the ones on which I used to record names, numbers and notes. Matchbooks went out of my life after my last Lucky Strike, and that was 22 years ago. Nothing in the heap was that old.
   I've been accumulating stuff like this for years, and it's always the same.  The heap grows, the papers begin to turn color, I forget the what and the why, and just keep heaping until the heap threatens to topple. I should say until my wife threatens to topple the heap, and me along with it.
   That usually works. The threat of having to pick it and myself up off the floor finally moves me to action. And there's always a payoff.
   Today I found treasure near the bottom of the heap. A small book entitled "Dorothy Parker." The cover bears only the initials DP.  The title appears on the spine, along with "The Viking Portable Library, Introduction by W.Somerset Maugham, The Viking Press."  The cover may have been orange at one time. The renewed copyright date was May, 1944.   I don't remember how or where I came by it.
    I said it was small, but that referred to its dimensions, and apparently accounted for its portability. There are 534 pages of contents.  Too many for this exercise, so the reading has to wait for a lazy day in Spring, and I look forward to it as I do the anticipation of any meeting with old friends.
   My late sister, Pat, the English Lit major, introduced me to Dorothy Parker's "Enough Rope," a book of poems that ranks with Parker's best.  Pat was two years older, and always did her best to encourage my interest in academics, however futilely.  But Mrs. Parker was funny and I loved her stuff.
   Some darts, gleaned from the Internet:

 "Brevity is the soul of lingerie."

"If you want to know what God thinks of money, look who He gave it to."

[In a performance], Kathryn Hepburn "Ran the gamut of emotions from A to B."

"As Cleopatra,Tallulah Bankhead barged down the Nile last night, and sank."

"It is not a novel that should be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force."

And this poem:
"I like to have a martini,
 Two, at the very most.
 After three, I'm under the table,
 After four, I'm under the host."

And, perhaps the most imperishable,
"Men seldom make passes at girls who wear glasses."

And, perhaps the most apocryphal:
When asked in childhood to describe the Immaculate Conception, Parker's supposed reply was, "Spontaneous Combustion."  

   Dorothy Parker was a spirited and intuitive observer of human nature and social mores, by turns, aggressive and defiant, then hesitant and brought low.
   She retired undefeated, with the wish that her tombstone be inscribed "Pardon My Dust."
   Her wit remains as fresh as the day it was uttered. It will well withstand the erosion of time.
Thanks be.