By Dr. James L. Snyder
Growing up we did not have a TV in our home. My father was just too cheap to spend the money for something as frivolous as TV, so he bought comic books to read. “Books,” he often said to us, “are better than watching some silly TV program.” They were also cheaper.
Then one day something happened that changed everything. On November 22, 1963, the president of the United States, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, was assassinated. The next day my father went out and bought our first TV set.
Then everything changed in our home.
Our father stayed on top of all the stories connected with the president’s assassination. It was a sad time for our country.
My siblings and I were introduced to a phenomenon called cartoons. Now, I had a large collection of comic books which, if I had today and I could sell them and become a very rich man. However, a TV cartoon was something altogether different. It took us a long time to realize those cartoon characters were just that and not real people. To us, they were as real as real got.
When we got home from school, my siblings and I headed for the TV set and were mesmerized by these cartoons. We loved them all.
I say we loved them all but there was one exception. That one exception was Porky Pig. We hated to see Porky Pig on the TV because he always said, “That’s all, folks!” And that was the end of the cartoons.
The first time we saw him say that we cried. “What do you mean that’s all?”
We just could not believe our eyes and ears, but that was the end of the cartoons for the day and we would have to wait until tomorrow to see them again. It is not like today when you can watch anything you want, anytime you want to watch it.
That was when I was young, but as I got older I began to see that Porky Pig could serve a situation right well.
For example, when I was in school and the teacher went on and on and I was getting so bored that I would have liked to have brought Porky Pig into the classroom to say, “That’s all, folks!” Then we would head to the outside playground where the real fun was.
Porky Pig would have been a great blessing in most of my classes. Not that the teachers were boring, mind you. Just that what they were saying was boring. Nothing is more boring than when somebody is talking about something you have no interest in whatsoever. That is when we need, “That’s all, folks!”
Don’t let this get around or I will deny it, but as a teenager sitting in church I often wished that Porky Pig would walk down the aisle while our pastor was preaching and say, “That’s all, folks!” (I wonder how many people think that while I’m preaching?)
Sometimes you have enough of something and just want it to stop and just don’t know how to do it.
I imagine, I just am not going to ask, but at the dinner table there are times when the Gracious Mistress of the Parsonage would like to bring Porky Pig into the dining room to say to me, “That’s all, folks!”
Of course, because Porky Pig is a pig she might be afraid that I would eat him by mistake. She may be right about that.
Lately, I have been thinking of Porky Pig and what he could do today. I am not sure if the cartoons are still on television I have long ago given up watching them. Of course, if you watch any political program on TV it does resemble a cartoon, at least a bad cartoon.
Porky Pig could come in handy, particularly concerning politics. If I see one more political debate or whatever they call it on TV, I think I am going to scream. Here is exactly where Porky Pig could come in for the rescue.
Just as they begin some political program, Porky Pig comes on the set and says, “That’s all, folks!” And we move on to something less boring. That would be a great help today.
I think what makes politics so boring and obnoxious are the politicians themselves. There should be a rule somewhere that says that anybody running for any kind of political office needs to hire Porky Pig in order to know when enough is enough. If anybody is interested, I’m willing to hire myself out to be someone’s Porky Pig, I can say “That’s all, folks” in a variety of sarcastic tones.
Porky Pig could give the American public a well needed rest and break from all the nonsense we see on TV.
I know in Washington there’s a lot of pork that goes around, but the kind of pork I’m talking about is Porky Pig who can stand up and speak for the American public, “That’s all, folks!” We need somebody to be America’s voice today and as far as I am concerned, Porky Pig fits the job.
Everything should have an end in sight somewhere. I like what the apostle Peter said. “But the end of all things is at hand: be ye therefore sober, and watch unto prayer” (1 Peter 4:7).
Could someone in the political arena, please stand up and say “That’s all, folks!”
