Careful readers of the Tribune’s obituary pages have seen the name Donna Beth Froio many times in the last quarter century.
Tributes to her, usually in the form of poems written in Spanish, appear in the “In Memoriam” section of the paid death notices five times a year: on Christmas, Easter, Father’s Day, on the anniversary of her birth in February 1963 and on the anniversary of her death at age 16 in May 1979.
The translation of a 1984 poem reads:
Dearest Skidjy / I asked you to hang tough / And you did. / I asked you to believe / And you did. / I asked you not to fear / ‘Cause your dad was near / And you trusted me. / And now you’re gone. / And I don’t know why. / I’m sorry. “Skidjy” was her nickname.
No more hugs and kisses / or lunches / No more Skidjy / or brunches / No more daughter / No more father.
The anguish in these verses is palpable, unashamed and undiminished.
From Father’s Day 2004:
If only my heart could speak / You know what it would tell you? It would tell you / That I love you and that I miss you.
The author is Dominic Froio, 78, a gruff and heartbroken ex-Marine and retired ink salesman who is not, it turns out, particularly fluent in Spanish.
But the last great time he and Donna Beth had together was a trip to Mexico in the spring of 1978–a divorced dad and his only child on Easter vacation–and since then, that country and its language have provided a haven for Froio and an outlet for the love that was meant for Donna Beth.
She began feeling mysterious aches in July 1978, and before she died the next spring of raging lymphatic cancer she made her dad promise to return to Mexico, as the two of them had planned:
I went to Mexico, sweetie / Just like you asked me to. / This time it wasn’t beautiful. / Just sad. / There was no happiness there / Only your lonely dad. / I visited hospitals, churches / And the orphanage, too. / But in all the kids’ faces / I could only see you.
This poem, published the Christmas after Donna Beth died, only hints at the story of a wandering, grief-ravaged man on a nearly suicidal alcohol binge who, he says, ended up at the door of an orphanage in Acapulco where the directors invited him in and where he found a reason to keep living.
Part of Froio’s modest suburban home is a shrine to Donna Beth, as you might expect–her bedroom preserved down to the 8-track tape player, photos and paintings of her on many walls and so on.
But an even larger part is a museum that tells of his devotion to impoverished children in Mexico. This devotion began during Froio’s darkest hour and continues to this day in the form of frequent visits to a community south of Acapulco where he brings gifts and provides some financial support to nearly two dozen kids.
Framed photos of these and other children, three of whom he legally adopted when they were in their teens but with whom he is no longer in close contact, are plentiful in the house. So are toys he is in the process of wrapping and scrapbooks with news clippings, letters, birth announcements and other memorabilia from Mexico.
Despite all the time he has spent there over the years, he said, he still speaks the language “like a child” because he learned it from children. A Tribune employee helps him translate his poems from English into Spanish.
Three flagpole monuments at the College of DuPage and a foreign-language book collection at a local library bear Donna Beth’s name, as do several charitable efforts. But it is in her father’s outreach to disadvantaged children in the country she loved and the unceasing apostrophes of his mournful muse that her memory best lives on.
If one poem best explains why Dominic Froio writes so often and so publicly to his late daughter, it’s this one from May 2002:
Who in any form remembers you? / Only a few / Many you’ll find are very occupied / Doing things that they think are better / To show how much they love you and they miss you / But today on the day of your death / What a shame / That at the side of your tomb / I don’t see anyone / Only me.
