By Luke White ’99
My mother, Pam White, retired from Milton in 2002. As a Health Center counselor, head of the peer-counseling program, and longtime leader of Octet, Pam used her vibrant spirit and warmth to touch many at Milton. Since that time, Pam enjoyed starting a small private practice as a clinical social worker, playing tennis, and becoming a grandmother three times over. As she would put it, “there’s just one little glitch”: in 2009, shortly after her 61st birthday, she was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease.
Everyone whose life has been touched by this illness understands the long and humbling journey that lay ahead for all of us. Pam’s diagnosis came at an interesting time: during her 60th year, she announced that she had begun working on The Genius of Marian, a biography of her mother, renowned painter Marian Williams Steele, who died of Alzheimer’s in 2001. Unable to write the book on her own, Pam began working on the project in a video format with my brother Banker White, a documentary filmmaker. What began as a video project to tell my grandmother’s life story and commemorate her art has evolved into a feature-length documentary film. The Genius of Marian follows our family’s struggle to adapt to the changes that come with Alzheimer’s disease; it is an intimate portrait of a loving family. I invite everyone associated with Milton to experience this story when it is released in April.
In a way, Pam made her life’s work helping people tell stories. Her inviting, warm style just gets you talking, and talking, and by the end, you feel better about whatever was ailing you. You have a new version of your story, a brighter one that she helped you create. I took this skill for granted growing up in the way only a kid can take his parents completely for granted, but as her son and a proud member of Milton’s thirteen-year club, I had a first hand view of how well liked and valued she was. “Your mom is so cool,” my classmates would tell me, a designation I would imagine not many school counselors enjoy. “She’s amazing,” they all said. “She really listens.”
Pam White was a member of Milton’s Health and Counseling Center until her retirement in 2002.
Working with her as a peer-counselor at Milton and having chosen a career in mental health myself, I now understand how well deserved this high esteem was. Pam understands the world through her connection to others, through her capacity for deep and mutual understanding. It came as no surprise to me, then, that after retiring from this position she so loved, she wanted to tell someone else’s story. The Genius of Marian captures my grandmother’s unique and pertinacious artistic spirit as much as her painter’s mastery of color and depth. It’s a living tribute that ought to give my mother pride. The real tribute of the film, though, is to Pam: to her indomitable will, to the strength of familial bonds she worked so hard to create, and to the warmth and spirit that remains, even as parts of her are slipping away.
Having lived much of the story it tells, I feel that my brother’s film is true and honest, even as it is uplifting in the face of a devastating illness. Alzheimer’s disease is a heartbreaking process of loss, yet The Genius of Marian is a poignant meditation on remembering, and one that I hope will shed light on the countless lives it has touched. My sister, Devon White Angelini ’94, and I are working to support our family’s project by developing educational content for the film to reach audiences in theaters, medical schools, health-care facilities and beyond. Through screenings of the film, educational seminars and unique educational short films, we hope to create safe spaces for people to share resources, provide support to one another, and fight stigma through open discussion. Through helping people who are affected by this disease, their friends and families, we hope to give our mother’s inspiration, to tell her story, another life.
Screen the film:
Tribeca Film Festival:
April 17–28 (World premier)
Independent Film
Festival Boston:
April 24–30 (Boston premier)
For film information:
https://www.facebook.com/
TheGeniusOfMarian
https://twitter.com/geniusofmarian
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