Mackenzie Astin · @MackenzieAstin
31st Mar 2016 from TwitLonger
Thank You.
My mother was so many things to so many people.
By the time I came along, she had already been deeply embedded in the public consciousness—as an inspiration, a friend, someone with whom a teenager could easily relate, and as a survivor. By the time I came along, she’d been awarded, rewarded, regaled, and through the wringer. She’d come from nothing to see great heights, fallen, and risen up again. She was part of countless lives, countless hearts, and countless minds. She was someone people felt for, rooted for, who could be counted on to tell a story with every ounce of her other-worldly gift. She was a massive presence in a tiny figure by the time I came along.
Many, many, times I have been told by one person or another, upon learning of my relatedness to mom, “I grew up with her!” “…We have that in common,” I would learn to say, and eventually I was old enough to understand what that really meant. It meant I had a lot in common with a lot of people. A lot of people grew up with her. A lot of people have had her in their lives for many years. In their homes and living rooms, in their chit-chats and gossip, in the creases and folds of the fabric of their own individual experience.
It is precisely this presence that makes her passing so poignant. A part of us has left. A piece of the late 20th-century collective childhood is no more. And that hurts. That brings to mind our own mortalities in a manner hitting awfully close to home. We grew up with mom. We grew old with mom. And together, we mourn her moving on.
A thing occurred to me yesterday afternoon that instantly brought saltwater down my face. Not in streaks of sadness, though, these were tears of wonder. I was broken by the beauty of the success in her later-life mission. By how plainly I could see the effects of what became her cause. The back half of mom’s career offered fewer opportunities to share her considerable acting talent, you see, because Hollywood and maturity very rarely share a mirror. And while this is less a tragedy than a reflection of our narcissism, the near-absence of roles for a woman over forty forced mom onto the road again. But instead of acting, she just spoke. She spoke of her struggles with mental illness. She spoke all over to audiences that could easily recognize in themselves the very same struggle. She crisscrossed this country promising people a way to beat back the demons so many of us share, to keep ourselves afloat, and to weather our communal storms.
And so, as in my youth, I met many, many, people who upon recognizing my Duke-ness would bring one hand to their heart and one hand out towards me crying, “Your mother saved my life,” or “my cousin’s life,” or “my daughter’s life.” And together we would marvel that a woman so talented at pretending could also come to the rescue just telling the truth.
It is the telling of this truth that I believe is most responsible for the incredible outpouring of love and support and grief and despair when the news of her passing became public on Tuesday. Hundreds of thousands of tweets, a million shares, blocks of prime-time airtime, phone calls, texts, emails, direct messages, and so on. The worldwide family that her talent and candor had created came together as one in our love for her, our appreciation for her work, our aching at her loss, and our relief in the fact that as her body failed her, she needn’t suffer a moment more.
Jennifer and I are humbled by the grace of all your compassion. We are forever to remember the day my mother left as the day we realized how powerful her impact truly was. We cried those tears of wonder at just how large our family actually is. How my mother’s life was lived by not only her, but by all of us together.