Saying adieu
From the day I met Frances Love Froidevaux, her curiosity about the world and genuine interest in people and places was an inspiration. Thus it seemed fitting I heard about her passing while we were in St. Petersburg last month.
My friend Francie was truly an international soul with a Renaissance flair toward living. Fluent in French, she was a master at knitting and an energetic traveler. She appreciated talent of all kinds and encouraged its development in others. Their family lived in a number of places—Europe, Asia, the US—and no matter where they called home, Francie brought her love of music, fine art, and literature to her surroundings
Francie was also a Wyoming woman through and through, proof that being part and parcel of a place is more about philosophy and perspective than the timing of one's birth. Her father, David Love, was the state's geologist extraordinaire profiled by John McPhee in Rising From the Plains. The opening lines in that book talk about the journals of David Love's mother, which were then unpublished. Eventually, Francie and her sister Barbara Love edited their grandmother's journals into a bestselling collection called Lady's Choice: Ethel Waxham's Journals and Letters, 1905-1910.
The basic story goes like this: Ethel, a Wellsley graduate who had studied Greek, Latin and French, went to the center of Wyoming to teach in a one-room schoolhouse. There she met John Love, a Scottish sheep rancher, who spent the next five years wooing Ms. Waxham. Documentarian Ken Burns incorporated their unconventional courtship into some 45 minutes of the PBS Series “The West.”
This background is only relevant in understanding the kind of stock Francie came from--down-to-earth folks who highly valued education and making the most of life's opportunities. She always balanced her heady life experience with a rock-solid, roll-with-the-punches attitude.
It also seems fitting to post this memorial on the Life in the Tetons blog, as Francie loved this area. Francie and Claude built a log cabin north of Victor in the Teton foothills about 20 years ago, using it as a summer retreat from their home in Laramie, hosting music nights for the neighborhood, welcoming countless relatives and friends there from all over the world.
McPhee said that Ethel Waxham wrote “with such wit, insight, grace, irony, compassion, sarcasm, stylistic elegance, and embracing humor that I could not resist her.” These words capture her granddaughter's indomitable spirit as well.
Rest in peace, Francie. I will miss your quirky grin and our long talks about books and journeys; I will always treasure your insight and I'm grateful for your friendship.
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