The book, “Tuesday with Morrie” captured the final lesson between a college professor, Morrie, the author Mitch Albom.
Morrie’s Background
Morrie was born into a humble family in the city of New York. At the age of nine, his mother fell ill and died. The death of Morrie’s mother haunted Morrie all through his life. Morrie was miserable, he was denied fatherly affection for couple of years until his father got married to Eva. Eva showed love and affection to Morrie, an emotional outpour which he had lacked for years. Eva’s love was instrumental in Morrie’s education, which was why he decided to become a teacher after his father could not get him a job at the fur factory.
Morrie’s encounter with Mitch
For every chapter, Mitch narrated his relationship with Morrie during his days in the college. Mitch began his college education in 1976 at Brandeis University, where he met Morrie in a sociology class. Mitch was very touch in his school days, this was to compensate for being one of the youngest student on campus. Morrie and Mitch became very close and had a trusting student and teacher relationship.
At the completion of his college education, Mitch moved to New York to further pursue his ambition as a piano player. Although Mitch did not make success as an instrument player, however, his fortune changed materially, he attained material success after the demise of his uncle and he decided to pursue a degree in Journalism and finally settle in Detroit to work as a pundit. While in college, Morrie persuaded Mitch to write a thesis on football culture, and to always keep in touch, though, Mitch did not oblige the request
Morrie, a dance enthusiast, had to stop dancing due to ill-health. Morrie’s health began to worsen due to asthma illness, breathing became difficult and doctors run various medical test on him until he was diagnose d with ALS in 1994. Consequent upon his ill-health, Morrie decided to quit teaching at Brandels and also granted series of TV interviews. Mitch saw the interview of Morrie and decided to pay him a visit. Morrie’s health further deteriorate and he was confined to a wheelchair. Morrie was excited to see Mitch visit him but on the contrary, Mitch finds his visit to Morrie very uncomfortable as he realized that he is no longer the kind of idealistic student Morrie knew in college. Mitch became even more uncomfortable when Morrie offer to tell him what it feels like to die. Being uncomfortable, Mitch took his leave but promised Morrie that he would come back.
Mitch departed from Morrie but couldn’t stop to think of the man, even during his official assignment to cover the Wimbledon. Upon his return to Detroit, he called Morrie and requested he pays him him visit again. Mitch arrived to Morrie’s house bearing food after remembering how much Morrie loves food. Mitch once again felt so uncomfortable when Morrie began to cry about his ordeal with death and how he’s so much more affected by death in the world now that he himself is dying.
To be continued…..
Balance is key