An Introduction To The Essays Of Frank Finale

by Rich Youmans

To read these new essays by Frank Finale is to be continually inspired—and surprised. Inspired because Frank, like all true writers, has the ability to make a story come alive through the telling details. Follow him through these twenty-one essays and nineteen poems, down the one hundred twenty-seven miles of the shore's coastline, and you'll find yourself on a tour unlike any other; even long-familiar places will be seen as if for the first time. Take, for example, his description of Sandy Hook and its surrounding bay:

"The Sandy Hook peninsula looked like the profile of a dinosaur: its skull, eye, and mouth at the northernmost point, with a thick chest tapering to the legs. It even had a tail—the spit of sand connecting it to the mainland. In the distant Atlantic, I could see ships passing to and from New York Harbor, pleasure crafts of all kinds... The toy-like boats etched the bay with their small wakes, white as the stripes in the American flags that some of them flew."

Or Atlantic City:

"I begin to look for a slot that's open, taking note of the people I pass in the aisles... Everyone seems mesmerized, a feeling that's only accentuated by the many lights and mirrors that seem to pour into one another. Round light bulbs—red, yellow, green, and blue—appear everywhere, swagged from hook to hook on the ceiling. By a casino restaurant, twinkle-lights wrap around the branches of an indoor tree. Above me, neon lights rise on ascending wires and reach the high ceiling, creating a circus "Big Top" of lights. It's all very bewitching."

Or Cape May:

"Gaslight lampposts adorned the thin-as-six-o'clock walks as we ambled up one street and down another, gazing at the many pastel-colored houses. White-picket or wrought-iron fences bordered gardens of tulips, daffodils, pansies, hyacinth, and lilac. One street had a sign tacked onto an elm that swelled the sidewalk and tilted the curbing. “Caution, trees lean out into the street,” it read. We were delighted to find nature being given the right of way in a town that seemed to have appeared out of time, like Brigadoon."

Through such passages, Frank not only transports readers to the Jersey Shore but deepens their experience of it, and in so doing, he will undoubtedly inspire readers to conduct their own explorations. But Frank is much more than just a tour guide par excellence; he is also a poet and artist. And that's where the "surprise" comes into play. A canoe trip down Cedar Creek becomes, at one point, a commentary on the intrusion of human beings into nature. A gambling trip turns into a reverie on family and love. Enter a Frank Finale essay, and you never know where you'll end up—or what emotions will be touched.

Of course, none of this comes as a shock to those familiar with Frank's previous compilation of essays and poems, To The Shore Once More. I had the privilege to write the introduction for that first volume as well, and in reviewing Frank's work from that collection I find that he has lost none of his gifts as a writer. Both books present equally evocative descriptions of life along the Jersey Shore, all drawn from Frank's real-life experiences—especially those involving his wife, Barbara, a constant companion in both life and literature.

Yet while this current book might be viewed as a sequel to its popular predecessor, it also differs in several important aspects. Unlike the earlier volume, which contained material that had been previously published in various magazines and anthologies, this book contains work that was written expressly for it over the course of one year. While this may have made for many exhausting nights, it also allowed Frank to plot a book that would broaden its scope of the shore. In essence, he took the entire New Jersey coastline—from Sandy Hook to Cape May—as his personal domain, exploring the notable towns and attractions that piqued his curiosity and spurred his imagination.

The book also differs from its predecessor in tone. Frank has always plumbed his experiences for material, and in the past he took moments of celebration and tenderness—family outings and holidays, for example, or romantic interludes with Barb—and depicted them as complete stories in themselves. While his new essays take similar topics, this time they've been imbued with additional dimension: taken as a whole, they show Frank in various stages of his life and, like the facets of a diamond, play off one another to enhance the overall effect. We see him as the young man, bright with innocence, and we see that innocence lost. We see him meet his future wife and her three sons, whom he soon adopts as his own, and we see them as they grow old together. We see various friends and family members, and how their sad fates—murder, divorce, terminal illness—affect those around them. In these essays, some of which are the most touching I've ever read, we see Frank trying to use his lifetime's experience to transform lost innocence into newfound wisdom.

Frank's gift is to be able to write about such moments in a way that is in itself a celebration of life. For that's what this book truly is: a celebration—of life, of the shore, and of the moments that, when totaled, make for beautiful memories. As Frank writes, "the world could always use a little more beauty, no matter how small." I couldn't agree more—and I'm thankful we once again have Frank Finale's essays and poems to show us how true that is.