May 4, 2005

Times FeatureMurry Frymer

April is for Anniversaries

By Murry Frymer
Times Columnist

I remember April.

My father died 25 years ago. That is a long time, but I know him better today than I did then. My father was the silent man, an immigrant who let my mother raise the family. We never did talk much, something that was so troubling to me back then 25 years ago when it was time for last goodbyes.

Today, I am my father. At least I understand him better and sympathize with his inability to explain himself. He was dutiful, hard working, a man who saw his role as the family’s provider. He was a man of another generation, living by rules that are even more outdated today. I wish that I had probed more. But I was the son and also living by rules that did not include probing.

I remember April.

FDR died 60 years ago, something that is also personal because FDR was my parents’ greatest hero. They saw the president as their protector, a man who fought for the workingman and woman, which my parents were, and then fought to defeat the Nazis, the scourge which had murdered our family in Europe.

Now, 60 years later, FDR is being criticized more. He seemed impervious to the racial issues of his time, making political allies of the Dixiecrats in the South, perhaps because he needed their support for his economic agenda. He incarcerated innocent Japanese Americans. He turned back a shipload of refugees from Europe and sent them back to their fate, death in most cases.

He was very much loved at the time, yet today many of his social programs are under attack, including Social Security, which helped lead the American worker out of poverty and provided some security in their waning years. The judgments will continue to change in coming years.

I remember April.

Some people think that Silicon Valley died in April five years ago. Certainly it hit its investment peak, a wild ride to the top of the roller coaster that abruptly turned down. Today, five years later, the resurrection of this valley’s economy has yet to happen and some of the former stars, like Sun Micro and JDS Uniphase seem ready to disappear entirely.

There is a long list of former giants that are merely holding on today, though others continue their comeback. Was it all a dream? Can Humpty Dumpty ever be put back again?

I remember April.

Our family moved from Canada to the U.S. in April 60 years ago. My, what joy I felt! I was a child whose every hero was American, from the GIs depicted in all the films, to the major leaguers on the ball field. We were moving to the home of the Cleveland Indians, where I became the team’s greatest fan. Strange, today some Americans are moving to Canada, championing that country’s health care system or its avoidance of military adventures. Certainly fewer Canadians are coming here. Today’s immigrants are more likely Asian or Mexican, but still I see the same joy at their arriving and the anticipation of the kind of a life that can be built here and not from where they came.

I remember April.

April was the month the Federal Building in Oklahoma City was blown up, a tremendous shock to our assurance of a non-politically-violent America. At the time, many were sure that Arabs were behind the blast that killed so many. But the killers were American. The even-bigger tragedy at the World Trade Center was yet to come. This time Saudis made up most of the murderers and this time it was September, not April.

I remember April.

My birthday is in April. It is not exactly an occasion for balloons. But I point out that Shakespeare and I and Barbra Streisand and Shirley MacLaine were all born a day or two apart, and astrology makes something of that. My resemblance to Shakespeare is especially obvious.

Contact Murry at murry@timesmediainc.com.