AFTER A 1,000 DEATHS, FRANCES RESTS IN PEACE

By Juan Montoya
She saw her husband and love of her Fred Sr. die after a lingering illness after 56 years of marriage.
And then she was there when her other love of her life, Fred. Jr., was brutally stabbed to death before her eyes.
I saw the obituary announcement in the local daily that Frances Bustinza has gone on to her eternal rest earlier this month. After 87 years, having raised a family, and surrounded by er grandchildren, it was enough.
When I used to live on Poinsetta Street, Frances and her son Fred would often come visit and sit in the shade of the verdant ebony trees that grace that neighborhood. She liked to sit and chat with my significant other and make over the two boys. She and my ex would knit ornaments for their coffee tables and mantles while Fred Jr. and I would engage in more intoxicating pursuits.
After a time, we would walk over and visit Frances, Fred. Sr. and Fred Jr at their home along the frontage road off U.S. 77. Fred had fashioned a studio in the family garage and he would show off his work.
Frankly, some of the more esoteric pieces were lost on my uncritical art taste, but Fred took it with a grain of salt.
"The human eye can't appreciate art anymore," he would growl. "Our vision has been spoiled by electronic images. We don't appreciate the brush strokes or the composition of the paint as people used to in the past."
Throughout all this, Frances would sit smiling benignly and look at Fred with the love in her eyes that only a mom could have for her brilliant son.
"They're both so smart," she would comment to my better half approvingly.
I, of course, knew better. Merely going to art school at Rutgers, as Fred did, or to Michigan, as I had, did not necessarily make one smart. Fred wasn't taught to paint or draw in New Jersey, but those skills were enhanced by the ambiance generated by art people and practitioners. But tell that to a mom.
After Fred Sr. died, mother and son were inseparable. Wherever Fred went, Frances was there to make sure he had a way home.
She dearly loved her son and must have suffered untold pain when he was killed before her eyes in a bar brawl.
But now Frances has gone on to join her two Freds wherever people go after they leave this earthly plane. Rest Easy Frances. You're home now.