"I’m not sure my mother understands Twitter or why I tell her millions of people love her — but she says she’s ver[sic] touched,” Scott Simon tweeted to 1.3 million followers on his mother’s deathbed.
It was one of many such public announcements the NPR journalist and host of Weekend Edition Saturday made in the weeks leading up to his mother’s passing:
“Heart rate dropping. Heart dropping.” / “You wake up
and realize you weren’t dreaming. It happened. Cry like
you couldn’t last night.” / “Between last minute flights,
fees, lawyers, forms, cemeteries etc. how do families afford
deaths?”
Simon wasn’t the first to do so, but his broadcast of the before, during, and after-death experience inspired both intense public criticism and unfailing support. As one reviewer said, “He just needs an Internet hug.” Another was less sympathetic: “What’s with the tweet when he said he was holding his mother’s hand? I imagined him by his mother’s side doing just that … and typing in his tweet with the other hand. It’s his way of dealing, but in my experience, sometimes you’re more in the moment if you just put your mobile device away.”
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