Tuesdays With Morrie.

“Love each other or Perish.”

I could begin with the expected.

The expected being, “So, I read this book recently…”

However, the truth is, it is anything but recent. I read ‘Tuesdays With Morrie’by Mitch Albom in 2008, when I was in the 11^th Grade, and yet every day I find my thoughts wandering to the teachings of Morrie Schwartz.

The book, so beautifully written has to be appreciated by everyone. And by appreciated, I mean, every literate person must read it, and every illiterate person must hear this story.

Morrie Schwartz, an old professor of the author, Mitch Albom, is forced to forfeit dancing, his favourite hobby, because he has been diagnosed with ALS, a debilitating disease that leaves his “soul, perfectly awake, imprisoned inside a limp husk” of a body.

And so the story revolves around the Professor and his student meeting up once a week, every Tuesday, to talk about the things at really matter in life. About Life, Love, Marriage, Happiness and eventually Death.

“All we know that this Life ends in Death,

What happens after that is known only to the Uncommunicating Dead.”

So now I ask you.

What would you do if you knew that your time was nearing ? That your time to say Goodbye was as close the last leaf falling in November ?

Travel the World ? Fulfill your Bucket List with your Best Friend ?  

Well, Morrie did not exactly have these options. He needed to stay where he was if he wished to live. He needed his medication.

However, in that period of time, when he sat idle with a blanket to warm his legs, he passed on “The Meaning of Life” to one man, who then lighted our lives by sharing it with the world.

“Death ends Life, not a Relationship”, Morrie once said. He cries unashamedly and encourages Mitch to do the same.      

Morrie has this strange acceptance of his death, and he earnestly tries to console himself of the fact that he is dying by saying “enjoy being a baby again”. 

In the initial stages of his disease, Morrie is fearful that he would become so dependent on another person that he would be unable to wipe himself. Towards the end, his fear turns into a reality.

“The truth is, once you learn how to die, you learn how to live.”

The life lessons taught to us by Morrie are irreplaceable, and the depth in every word whispered wise beyond our lives.

He says, “Part of me is every age. I’m a three year old, I’m a five year old, I’m a thirty-seven year old, I’m a fifty year old. I’ve been through all of them, and I know what it’s like. I delight in being a child when it is appropriate to be a child. I delight in being a wise old man when it is appropriate for me to be a wise old man. Think of all I can be! I am every age up to my own.”

At Morrie’s funeral, Mitch recalls his promise to continue their conversations in his mind. Mitch had assumed that it would be very awkward, however when the time comes, he realizes that it comes naturally that he had expected.

In Mitch Albom's other book, 'The Five People You Meet in Heaven', a line exists, "All endings are beginnings. We just don't know it at the time."

His teachings will never turn obsolete, as they have been framed eternally for the world to experience.  Mitch Albom and Morrie Schwartz together compiled this book as their ‘Last Thesis’ together.

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