Her ‘mini me’ was fatally shot in Kansas City. Now this mom mourns her free spirit
Randie Smith was so much like her mom that Sherell Lewis called her only daughter her “mini me.”
They were basically the same height — Smith was an inch taller — had the same smile and worked at the same place. They even bought the same car — red Mini Coopers. Lewis’ was a 2007 model. Smith’s a 2006.
Lewis, 46, has been thinking of those things ever since her daughter was fatally shot Monday night. She was found inside a crashed car at about 8 p.m. She was 27.
Smith was Lewis’ only daughter — her third of four children. She was adventurous and curious ever since she was a young child. Once, when she was a toddler, she dangerously stuck a fork in an electrical outlet because she wanted to see what would happen. She burned her pinky toe from doing so.
“She was always messing with things, wanting to know how things worked,” said her aunt, Rosalind Lane, 38.
She grew up in Kansas City and wanted to learn as much as possible. By 8 years old, she was helping her mom cook dinner, putting on her own apron and putting food in a blender, always making sure that she never made a mess.
It’s how Smith developed a love for cooking, one of her passions as she grew older. Smith loved learning how to cook vegan food and finding new recipes. She became vegan after watching the 2017 documentary “What the Health.” Soon, she got her mom to become vegan as well.
Smith and Lewis went to Pirate Bone Burgers, a restaurant that sells plant-based burgers, almost every day, Lewis said. It was her favorite restaurant.
“She made so many other people become vegan or want to become vegans because she shared her food with everyone,” Lewis said.
‘She lived it by her own rules.’
One thing Smith was known for was the gap she had in her two front teeth. Lewis didn’t want Smith to get braces that would close the gap.
So instead of braces, Smith got a tattoo that read “Respect the gap.”
In the last few years, Smith started dying her hair different colors, cutting it different ways, changing looks.
“She lived life and she lived it by her own rules,” Lane said. “Her hair was her trademark.”
She once had a heart etched on her hair, similar to Drake’s hairstyle, and had the heart colored in red. When one of her brothers graduated from Central Methodist University, Smith showed up to his graduation party with green hair — the school’s official color.
“She was so much her own person and it just was, it was refreshing because she didn’t follow people,” Lane said. “She made her own way, carved her own path, she didn’t wait for someone to tell her how to act or how to be. She just was.”
It also seemed like she was good at everything she tried, Lewis said. Every time she got a new job, it seemed like she was promoted in just a few months. She perfected talking in a British accent and spontaneously talked in it whenever she wanted. It would make people laugh.
Part of her spontaneity was going skydiving twice — the only family member who’s done it. Shewent to get a feeling of being free.
“She had some past trauma in her life and some things that happened to her that she had to get a lot of counseling for but she did the work,” Lewis said. “When she felt like she lifted those burdens off of her, she wanted to do something just to say, ‘I am free.’”
‘A saint is just a sinner who fell down and got back up.’
Smith’s killing was the 101st homicide of the year in Kansas City, according to data maintained by The Star. Lewis remembers a text Smith wrote her a few days before her death. She’d never received a text like this from her daughter.
“Just wanted to say how blessed and thankful I am to have grown up with a God-fearing momma,” the text read. “Even on my worst days I know God’s got me always and it’s because of you instilling my mind with the word. I have slipped for sure but a saint is just a sinner who fell down and got back up. Thank you for being you, I love you more than anything on Earth.”
Smith went on to write how she’s been reading her one-year Bible every morning and writing in a journal what that day’s reading meant to her.
Since Smith’s death, Lewis has been taking care of her dog, Zenna. Lewis can tell Zenna is extremely sad. Smith got the dog from one of her friends when she was just a puppy. Last year, Zenna had to have one of her front legs amputated. After the amputation, Smith taught her how to dance on her hind legs.
For Lewis, doing daily activities has become difficult. Her doctor prescribed her medication to help her deal with the grief. This is the first time someone from her family has been killed in a homicide.
“There’s no words,” Lewis said. “I’ve said a lot of words but none of those words — all of the words — could not describe what this is.”
Gun violence is the subject of a statewide journalism project The Star is undertaking in Missouri this year in partnership with the national service program Report for America and sponsored in part by Missouri Foundation for Health. As part of this project, The Star will seek the community’s help.
To contribute, visit Report for America online at reportforamerica.org.
