Sunday, October 4, 2009

Legends, Laughter, and Love

The day after Frank died, the sky was a gray pall over Coker Creek. It drizzled most of the day. It seemed that Coker Creek was crying.

Frank was everywhere in his beloved home town. He was a charter member of the Ruritans, and seemed to spearhead every event in which Ruritans participated: Monroe County Food Bank, Monroe County Senior Citizens, Monroe County Rescue Squad, Monroe County Beautiful, Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, Tellico High Senior Scholarship Fund, Coker Creek Elementary School, and Coker Creek Volunteer Fire Department, to name a few.

He was landlord for the strip center that was truly the center of Coker Creek, and that is locally referred to as “Murphy Corner”. Any day would find him chatting with his tenants and loading the various soda machines outside of the businesses. Frank must have had a sixth sense about his mama. More times than not, when Richard or I would be in Mamie’s garden, Frank would show up to check on things and offer a bit of teasing or advice.

Everybody who moved to Coker Creek was warmly welcomed by Frank. He helped people feel at home by helping them find in Coker Creek whatever interested them. If you were into community service work, he’d introduce you to Ruritans. If you loved cruising the mountains on your motorcycle, he’d lead you on his bike to the best scenery and around the best curves. If you were a US military veteran, he'd make sure that you were invited to the Veterans Day breakfast at Tellico High School. When Richard and I wanted Frank’s mama, Mamie, to teach us gardening, Frank plowed and tilled the garden plots for us. I wanted to write about Coker Creek; Frank set up interviews for me.

Frank did have some non-traditional solutions to everyday problems. He and his wife, Greta, had several pear trees in their front yard which produced more pears than any one family could possibly use. Frank had little patience for tedious tasks. So, when Greta gave him the job of peeling pears, his solution was to rev up his lathe. He loved laughing at himself recounting the mess this made of his workshop.

Frank, I think, lived by the biblical command to leave ten percent of your fields to be harvested by the needy. Once he and Greta canned all the pears for their family’s use, anyone was welcome to the surplus. He wouldn’t pick the pears for you, but you could harvest all you wanted. And pick them we did.

Frank had a huge appetite for all the good in life. When asked about the details of any of the many meetings he attended, he’d always begin with descriptions of the food served. His insulin-dependent diabetes didn’t diminish his appetite or his sweet tooth. He loved the jellies, jams, chutneys, pies, and carrot cakes that Greta, Mamie and I shared with him -- Probably loving them all the more because he appreciated the work that went into the growing, harvesting, and preparing of these delicacies.

We’ll all miss Frank’s legends, laughter, and love.