Philadelphia Memorial
February 25, 2010 | Posted by admin2 Yesterday, Don’s family and friends were to have held a planned memorial service for Don. I assume, and hope, that everything went off as expected, and that it was a memorable event. If any of this site’s readers were able to attend and would like to share their impressions here, we would welcome news of that event, and any other information about upcoming events that celebrate Don’s life and work.
I want to add as a personal note that, yesterday, one of my current students, who was also one of Don’s former students, came by my office hours. We were chatting about other things when the conversation turned to Don. This particular student is having a difficult go of things this semester, in large part because she deeply misses Don, who was (no surprise) an important mentor for her, who encouraged her work and, as she put it, changed her life forever by being one of her favorite instructors.
At one point, this student wondered aloud whether or not Don considered her “just another student.” This immediately struck me as impossible. Did Don consider any of us “just another” anything? I have to say that I really don’t think so, and I don’t think I am idealizing Don’s memory by saying so. I don’t know that I would say it about many people, but it does seem to me that Don probably did celebrate his students, each and every one, a little more than most. His absence on this campus continues to be felt.
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Hi, admin2. As I understand it, the family memorial was a week or two ago in North Philly; yesterday’s event at the Moonstone Arts Center downtown was more or less for friends.
I recognized three other people who’d known him at Temple U among the fifty or sixty people in attendance. Artists he’d collaborated with, white women whose houses he’d lived in, former students of his from his job at Macalester twenty years back, and the great Ella Torrey, who knew Don for almost forty years. Many wonderful and honest reminiscences. One young woman who regarded herself as Don’s student not from the classroom but from the commuter train; one older woman whom he’d struck up a conversation with when he’d seen her photocopying some Baldwin essays in West Philly. Some pretty intense crying here and there.
One of the messages I got from the event was that indeed, nobody was “just another” anything to Don. Don met one of those Macalester students here in Philly a few years ago and fell to the sidewalk salaaming her. Don would tell an abusive mother on the 23 bus, “Don’t treat your child that way.” Don would ask a coffeehouse waitress whom he felt he’d been treating to harshly, “Hey, Maria, who’s yer mama? Who’re your people?” The thing about Don, see, is what Richard Thompson said about Sandy Denny: “She had no skin at all. There was nothing between her and the world.” Which doesn’t only mean that he was easily wounded; it also means that he let everybody into his heart.
Thanks, Josh. My mistake. You are right that the event at the Moonstone Arts Center was organized by friends. Thank you for the correction, and also for your thoughts about the event.
The memorial was lovely. The room was filled to capacity with former students, friends, and Don’s “adopted families”. There was drumming, poetry reading, and of course readings from his books.
Many people shared stories about how Don had touched their lives.
We were delighted to finally meet Don’s great friend, Ella. She spoke to Don on the phone every single days for many years. She was a friend, a second mother, and helped him through hard times. She would tell him to sulk for a little bit and then throw it out and get back to living. I think we should all follow that advice.
Ella spoke about the appropriateness of the room in which the memorial was held. Every wall was lined with books, from floor to ceiling. Just like Don’s apartment.
There was a former student who made the trip from D.C. to Philly because she wanted to share how much Don meant to her. She was his student, his T.A. and his friend.
There were many funny stories as well.
The number of people who came and the emotions expressed were impressive. Don would have loved it!
I think some of us are still digesting the emotions from the memorial, and I’m sure more people will comment, and hopefully repeat their stories here.
To the student who wonders if she was just another student to Don, I would say there’s no way. Just like Josh said, if you had a connection with Don, it was real. Don’t doubt that. There’s no point in going down that road. I was one of the Macalester students at his service last week. It was helpful to be in a room of people who knew Don (ranging from age 11 to 85), knew him much better than I ever did, and who loved him for the person he was, flaws and all. I was Don’s student only for a few years, but he tapped into something deep inside me. I think he did that to people. He made me feel like my opinion mattered, like he wanted to know what I had to say, and then he would question my thoughts and make me think harder about things. It’s amazing to me that all that was twenty years ago, and that I am now older than Don was then. But I’ve always believed that time is irrelevant in the face of the connections we make with other people. I think Don would agree.
Thank you so much to the person who is behind this website. It has helped balance out the shock of learning about Don’s murder on the Internet. I hope you continue to keep us posted on the trial.
Josh really captured the essence of the event. I think it really reflected Don and his uniqueness. First of all it was held in a funky bookstore, which he loved to frequent. I found myself next to a book on Pagan Polyamory. His friends also reflected his character, interesting, diverse, witty, and talented, just like Don. It really was a nice and mostly up beat affair with honest reflections of a human being who was very human. There was not a lot of grieving at the tribute, so I guess we will all have to grieve in our own way, when it comes around. And it always comes around again.