‘Flesh’ is weak, but sometimes it’s right

Add comment December 24th, 2008

I may have written about this before, but it has come up again. Some people misuse “flush out” to mean “fill out” or “realize or make full, as by the addition of details.”

That should be “flesh out,” as in “fleshing out a report.” It comes from a sense of taking a bare-bones account and putting some “flesh” on it.

Other useful phrases with “flesh” in them include “in the flesh” (meaning “alive” or “in person”); “press the flesh” (informal for shaking hands and, more broadly, working a crowd); “one’s (own) flesh and blood” (one’s close relatives); and “fleshpot” (”bodily comfort and pleasure; luxury” or “a place where carnal pleasures are provided”; both are generally used in the plural). Notice that a fleshpot is not a person.

“Flush” is a versatile word in its own right. It can apply to a sudden and rapid flowing, blushing, glowing and driving from cover. We can flush the toilet, flush with embarrassment, flush birds from the brush, flush a wound with water, be flush with happiness, get hit flush in the face. Carpenters try to make sure doors are flush with walls. And in poker, a flush can be a winning hand.

“Flushing” is even a city — in New York’s Queens County, which had 2.2 million people as of the census in 2000. You could even say it’s flush with flesh.