Franklin Henry Means, 1922-2009

Long ago, when my wife Barb and I were in the nascent, getting-to-know-each-other phase of our relationship, she one day asked me, "Who are your heroes?" I was able to reply without hesitation: "John Lennon and my Dad." She was suitably impressed.

Suitably, I say, because it really had nothing to do with me. Instead, it was a testament to what kind of man my father was; his character was so evident that even that stupid, cocky, know-it-all teenage boy could see it.

Frank Means, my Dad, died today at age 86.

Dad's story was, in many ways, the common story of his generation: His childhood was shaped by the cruelties of the Great Depression; his young adulthood was spent in the service of his country during the Second World War and as part of the Army of Occupation of Japan; he returned home to marry the woman he loved, to build a family and a life (and, in so doing, to help rebuild our nation) through hard work, thrift and patience.

But to reduce the life of Frank Means to something so trite as a mere demographic exercise would be a great disservice. He was not a man of means, nor power, nor wide acclaim. Yet in that supposedly "ordinary" life, he was an extraordinary man.

In a world where simple, common decency is far too uncommon, Dad was the embodiment of the notion. He saw other people as human beings -- not as tools to be manipulated toward his ends, not as obstacles to be overcome, not as merely the money with which they might be parted nor as the sum total of their possessions, but as people endowed with human dignity and deserving of a basic respect.

When I was a child of perhaps ten, I found a five-dollar bill on the floor of the local dime store; when I brought it to the attention of the cashier, an elderly woman immediately claimed it as money that she had lost, and, though it was clearly not actually hers, I gave it to her. This bothered me, and I told Dad about it later. He thought about it for moment, and then said, "Well, she must have needed that money a lot more than you did."

Looking back now, of course, I know that Dad was right. The woman was clearly not well-off; that five dollars that might have bought me a few packs of baseball cards or a treat instead probably bought her a couple of meals. It was a lasting lesson that Dad managed to impart in thirteen simple words.

Outstanding, too, about Dad was his sense of humor. His smile was always at the ready, his laughter a big, booming affair that carried across the largest of rooms. We often joked that in order to find Dad, all you had to do was follow the sound of that laugh.

There was an enduring love of baseball that ran deep in him, a love that he also imparted to his children. As a young man, he played the game. Constantly, and well enough that he was actually offered a minor-league contract by the Milwaukee Braves. Dad, then with a young family, had to say no to that offer, to the vagaries and uncertainties of the minor-league life, but it certainly was evidence of the skill and joy that he brought to the sport.

By the time that I was old enough to be part of it, he was in his mid-fifties and had moved on to managing (along with his friend and brother-in-law, Chuck) Spooner's city league baseball team. I was only able to see Dad play once, when the team was so shorthanded that it pressed him into service. Even at age 54, he went 3 for 4 with an RBI against a pitcher less than half his age. I don't know if I ever saw him smile so broadly as he did that day.

There was Dad's tender, affectionate nature, which, too, lives on in his children. Having lost his own father to cancer when he was only twelve years old, he endeavored to give his family the paternal love that he had missed for much of his life. I don't think that a day went by in my childhood during which I was not told that I was loved. Dad taught me that a man could be masculine while still being warm-hearted, loving, even sentimental.

And of course no recollection of Frank Means would be complete without mention of the greatest love of his life: his wife, his partner, Kathleen Means. He said that he fell for her the first time he saw her, Chuck's little sister, when she was just thirteen years old. That love endured for more than half a century; his devotion to, and respect for, Mom was extraordinary, deep and abiding, lasting far beyond her death in January of 1999. He was always patient with her, kind, gentle, indulgent. A gentleman in the finest sense of the word.

As much as anything, that has shaped the man that I am today, the relationship that I have with Barb. He taught me to honor women and womanhood, to see as precious the bond between the two of us, as partners, as lovers, as friends.

In recent years, much of what made Dad who he was began to slowly, and then more precipitously, fade. The laughter came less and less often; the humor became less apparent. There were still glimpses of the real Dad, but he was gradually robbed from us, and, worse, from himself. That he has now rejoined Mom is only right. But that doesn't make it any easier for those of us who must go on without him, without his smile and love and wisdom.

My failings and failures in this world are my own. But most of the little good that I manage to achieve in this world is due to Frank Means.

I miss you, Dad, and I love you.

Ignorance Is Not Virtue

The culture wars continue, with now-well-known idiot (and Arizona Republican State Senator) Sylvia Allen exhibiting her vast knowledge of both geology and cosmology. That such a display of ignorance is essentially required to win a primary as a member of the GOP is a sad commentary upon the state of both the party and our nation.

In my dark hours, I fear that we are truly in a cosmic war, one that will determine whether mankind continues forward toward a true planetary civilization or sinks back into the darkness of its past, withering to eventual extinction. It is a fight between those of us who can embrace modernity and those who cling to callowness, superstition and prejudice.

In this fight, the likes of Osama bin Laden and Ali Khamenei are allied with the Sam Brownbacks and Pat Robertsons and James Inhofes of the world, each of them trying to stamp out rational thought in the name of his own version of fundamentalist purity, each of them certain that he is the true servant of the one true god, each ready to murder any and all who don't see the world as he does.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: If it wishes to survive, humanity had better hope that my side wins.