Eulogy for Frank A. Petro, Jr

Given by Kaytea Petro Saints Peter and Paul Church San Francisco, California February 2, 2007
See the Sphynx with my family. Cook faboulous meals with wine pairings for Cindy Sheenan to protest the war in Iraq until we managed to invite President Bush for a good Italian shakedown. Drive the Silk Road in the Jeep (and somehow find out how to use the snorkel function). Make life for illegal migrants slightly easier and make bank by using technology to envio dinero. Walk one of my daughters down the stairs of 624 Euclid in a white dress. Be a stand-up dad to all the kids whose own dads had fucked up or fucked off. Open a small four table restaurant with a twenty page wine list. Run away with Helen Turley/Hillary Clinton. Take cooking classes in Mexico. Learn to speak Spanish . Shoot George Bush. This is just a list of things that Frank Petro didn't quite get around to in his rich and abundant life. Looking at the list, we get a sense of how big he could think, and how big we can think, if we allow ourselves. Last winter, when it seemed sure he was a goner, he often took stock of his life, and spoke of the things he still wanted to do. Maybe because of this, he stuck around for another year, sharing his love, ceviche, and opinions on where we should be going with us. How many of us have heard these exhortations from Frank? "Treat it like a woman," "Why can't you cook, are you a candy ass?", "Roll up your sleeves", "Close the deal," "Nail that guy", "If I see that guy again I'll break his knees". (And for those of you who visited him in Arkansas) "Get me out of here I need my black shirt". Why is my dad so quoatable? Because he had wisdom? Or because he had the cajones to say what we were all thinking? I think the latter. What my dad was sometimes, what we all want to be�.the loudmouth who shoots it off in the right way�. The stand up guy that you could always call for a beach walk and a shakedown. My dad had this ability to make people think beyond themselves. I think it was because he always though big, he thought beyond and above what he was now. He shook us up and kept us on our toes. He kept us looking forward and kept us moving. I think he would want that to continue. But how? By telling each other to roll up our sleeves, by making the pizza, by driving to Panama, or by doing something more exciting? When you wandered off track, he brought you back by talking to you, by keeping the conection going, by listening. His strong arm act was just an act, it covered an understanding heart. A loving heart, and a keen mind. He didn't want to know just what you had done, but also what you were going to do, and how. Sometimes why. He wanted to have fun, and help people. His whole deal was about how to have an influence on you, not by force or even coercing you, but by convincing you. With fun or by logic or by tequila. Sometimes all at once.