Accident victim an inspiration to all who knew her

For more than 40 years as an educator, foster parent, and crisis counselor, Mary Centarrino Morningstar helped and counseled others while asking for little — and very often nothing — in return.

Mary Morningstar

The longtime Canton resident would sometimes buy clothes and other necessities for her students and once gave away her own dining room table because, in her words, someone else needed it.

“My god, no one gives as much as that woman has given,” remarked her companion and friend of many years Richard Kimball. “And Mary never thought twice about it; she just did it.”

It was this giving spirit that friends and relatives say they will remember most about Morningstar, whose life was tragically cut short in an automobile accident earlier this month on Walpole Street.

Morningstar, 65, had gone to the store that Sunday evening to buy groceries and was on her way back when she was struck head-on by a Corvette near Everendon Road — approximately a mile and a half away from her Plymouth Street home. The driver of the Corvette, 19-year-old Steven Walsh of Walpole, had to be airlifted to a Boston hospital and is facing a charge of motor vehicle homicide by negligent operation.

“We are all just devastated,” said Sharon Washwell, a close friend who worked alongside Morningstar at A New Day Crisis Center in Brockton, where they counseled victims of domestic violence and sexual assault.

Washwell, who grew up in Canton, had gotten to know Morningstar years earlier through her younger half sister, Eileen Frost, who is Morningstar’s adopted daughter.

The story behind their bond is a complicated one, but in essence, Frost had been in the foster care system when she forged a friendship with Morningstar beginning in her teenage years. Eventually she moved in with Morningstar, and several years later, after becoming a wife and mother, Frost surprised her “mom” on Christmas morning with adoption papers to make it official.

“It was a complete surprise,” recalled Washwell. “Eileen gave her the box with the paperwork in it and said to her, ‘I want you to adopt me.’ She and Mary just had this wonderful connection.”

Over the years, Morningstar would take in over a dozen other foster children — oftentimes a whole set of siblings — and she remained close with every one of them even into their adult years.

“She had always taken care of kids,” recalled Kimball, who used to marvel at her selflessness and dedication. “Most would stay for a while and then leave, but they always stayed in touch with her.”

Kimball said Morningstar was equally dedicated to her students throughout her 35 years as a special education teacher at the Lucy Stone School in Dorchester.

“She used to stop on her way home and buy things for the kids,” he said. “She just had such an impact on her students’ lives and cared deeply about every one of them.”

And when she retired from teaching six years ago, Morningstar “jumped right into working with people again,” according to Kimball. She completed a counselor training program offered by the Department of Public Health and volunteered at A New Day (formerly Womensplace Crisis Center) for two years before getting hired there as a crisis counselor.

Kimball said she even used her name as a part of her counseling after legally changing it to Morningstar sometime last year. The name was inspired by Mary Chapin Carpenter’s “Bright Morning Star” — a song about hope and redemption amid darkness and despair. And she shared this with Carpenter herself at a concert in Portsmouth last July.

“The song talks about real hardship in life and looking for that morning star, which is the sun that comes up,” said Kimball. “Just the idea that there’s always hope — there’s always, always hope. Just stay with it.”

And if there were any doubts about the impact that Morningstar had on people’s lives over the years, Kimball said they were firmly put to rest at Saturday’s funeral services, where hundreds of people, from all walks of life, packed the Dockray & Thomas Funeral Home to pay their final respects.

“It was packed,” confirmed Washwell, who encountered many of Morningstar’s former foster children as well as colleagues and clients from the crisis center and members of her church family at First Parish Unitarian Universalist, among others.

“The funeral was huge, just huge,” added Kimball. “People came from everywhere. We had this mobile home thing in New Hampshire — there were lots of sites and a lot going on there — and the door opens up on the day of the funeral and in comes the original owners of the entire campground, who are now in their 90s.”

Others expressed their feelings about Morningstar on her online condolences page, including some who credited her with turning their life around.

“Mary, thank you. You saved me,” wrote one person. “You gave me the strength I needed. You taught and loved me. You showed me there is hope and kindness in the world.”

Those closest to her are still trying to make sense of this tragic and sudden loss — how a woman so full of life, a woman described by Kimball as the “slowest, most careful driver in the world,” could be taken from them in an instant.

“Mary was just an all-around good person,” said Washwell of her friend. “She was fun-loving, kind, compassionate. She loved life and she lived it to the fullest. She was willing to do anything for anybody. She would give away whatever she had for someone else to have it.”

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Sometimes this life is no more than a moment / And sometimes the light is lost unto the dark / But courage hears the sound of dawn approaching / And each our own bright morning star.   –Mary Chapin Carpenter

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Posted by Jay Turner on Sep 26 2013. Filed under Features. Both comments and pings are currently closed.