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What is a legacy? It could be the possessions we leave behind for family and friends. It could be the places that people adorn with our names on plaques, or the events held in our honor. It could be the work we did, the things we built, or the things we achieved. I just don’t think those things matter too much, though. When we look back as we drift down that lonely river of death, I don’t think it will be the titles or the bank accounts or the honors that we see. The truest and realest legacy we can leave are the memories that we leave behind in the hearts of all those whom we depart from.
On Monday, March 1, 2020, at approximately 6:45 pm, my 17-year-old cousin, Madelynn Noel Troutt, was hit and killed by a drunk driver on her way home after dropping her little brother off at work. Madelynn was many things in life. She was an incredible cheerleader, a dedicated student, a reliable friend, and an inspiring leader. She was the friendly face that even the most isolated outcast in school could rely on to smile and make their day a little better. She was a daughter, a sister, a cousin, a niece, a friend. But above all, she was simply a beautiful soul. Her favorite flower was a sunflower; and like the elegant sunflower, ever reaching up, face towards the light, Madelynn held her head up to the world and smiled for all to see. Every soul that had the chance to cross paths with Madelynn, regardless of how brief or trivial the interaction, was changed for the better. She left marks on the hearts of people who never even knew her name because that is just the kind of person that she was.
There is an inherent quality to life. Regardless of one’s beliefs about where we came from or why we’re here, the fact that we are here remains. Madelynn was a person who embodied that nameless quality that embodies life, and it has made her death that much harder to cope with. As my family and I went through the motions of the days following her death, we were baffled by the amount of people who were touched. The hundreds of people that flowed through the funeral home for her visitation, the vigil held in our high school parking lot that even brought out the local news crews, and the fully-seated sanctuary at her final service were all the signs we needed of how much Madelynn meant to the world. The beautiful thing that exists in moments of collective grief is this -- that one cannot grieve without having once loved.
It will have been a month to the day by the time I submit this blog, and the pain simply does not get better. I do not subscribe to the notion that time heals all wounds, but that time simply makes us better at carrying the weight upon our hearts. My family has tried to honor Madelynn’s legacy through fundraisers, scholarships, tattoos, Facebook posts, and a plethora of other worthwhile attempts at remembrance; most of all, though, we have just tried to live out our day-to-days as Madelynn did -- like a sunflower, face stretched out to the world, always there trying to brighten someone else’s day just a bit. I am just puking my thoughts and feelings out onto this blog by now, but if someone has read this far, that is what I leave you with: try to live your life in such a way that you make a stranger’s day a little better, with your face towards the sun, taking the world on like a sunflower.
Bryson Sebastian is a McConnell Scholar in the class of 2024. He is studying political science and business at the University of Louisville.