The relationship between actress Jada Pinkett Smith and late rapper Tupac Shakur has been preserved through countless photos and poems that have made their way to the Internet but Will Smith's wife recently took a moment to reflect the on the lost of Pac and other friends in a letter posted to Facebook.
In the open letter, Smith speaks on losing her friend Maxine around the same time Tupac died. She says both lives were taken violently in tragic incidents.
Read the letter in its entirety below:
I'm having a deeply reflective Saturday.
In this picture I'm flanked by two extremely close friends of mine...Tupac and Maxine. They both died tragically not too far apart from one another. I flipped through more pictures of my youth only to come across at least 6 other friends who had been taken from this world...violently. I can't even count acquaintances. There was a time all that loss felt like the norm; today it felt unnatural, strange, downright wrong. Half of my life was surviving a war zone...genocide. I'm grateful for what I have survived. GratefuI that I can spend an evening with Fallon playing a pie in the face game. Grateful I didn't become a statistic like I often thought I would. Grateful that my own children don't have to confront the loss and violence in their neighborhood in the way their parents had to. But, I also feel helpless, a bit depressed that there are so many of us who still do. And it feels like it's only gotten and getting worse.
I'm hurting today.
Love you guys.
J
Back in 2012, Smith's daughter Willow posted to Instagram a letter she wrote to Tupac. In the letter, Willow sparks rumors about the rapper's death.
"I know you are alive someplace," she wrote. "I think that my mommy misses you. Can you come back so mommy and me can be happy! I wish you were here ... I really do!"
