Tuesdays With Morrie Page 3

  My days were full, yet I remained, much of the time, unsatisfied.

  What happened to me?

  "Coach," I said suddenly, remembering the nickname.

  Morrie beamed. "That's me. I'm still your coach." He laughed and resumed his eating, a meal he had started forty minutes earlier. I watched him now, his hands working gingerly, as if he were learning to use them for the very first time. He could not press down hard with a knife. His fingers shook. Each bite was a struggle; he chewed the food finely before swallowing, and sometimes it slid out the sides of his lips, so that he had to put down what he was holding to dab his face with a napkin. The skin from his wrist to his knuckles was dotted with age spots, and it was loose, like skin hanging from a chicken soup bone.

  For a while, we just ate like that, a sick old man, a healthy, younger man, both absorbing the quiet of the room. I would say it was an embarrassed silence, but I seemed to be the only one embarrassed.

  "Dying," Morrie suddenly said, "is only one thing to be sad over, Mitch. Living unhappily is something else. So many of the people who come to visit me are unhappy." Why?

  "Well, for one thing, the culture we have does not make people feel good about themselves. We're teaching the wrong things. And you have to be strong enough to say if the culture doesn't work, don't buy it. Create your own. Most people can't do it. They're more unhappy than me-even in my current condition.

  "I may be dying, but I am surrounded by loving, caring souls. How many people can say that?"

  I was astonished by his complete lack of self-pity. Morrie, who could no longer dance, swim, bathe, or walk; Morrie, who could no longer answer his own door, dry himself after a shower, or even roll over in bed. How could he be so accepting? I watched him struggle with his fork, picking at a piece of tomato, missing it the first two times-a pathetic scene, and yet I could not deny that sitting in his presence was almost magically serene, the same calm breeze that soothed me back in college.

  I shot a glance at my watch-force of habit-it was getting late, and I thought about changing my plane reservation home. Then Morrie did something that haunts me to this day.

  "You know how I'm going to die?" he said.

  I raised my eyebrows.

  "I'm going to suffocate. Yes. My lungs, because of my asthma, can't handle the disease. It's moving up my body, this ALS. It's already got my legs. Pretty soon it'll get my arms and hands. And when it hits my lungs . . .

  He shrugged his shoulders.

  ". . . I'm sunk."

  I had no idea what to say, so I said, "Well, you know, I mean . . . you never know."

  Morrie closed his eyes. "I know, Mitch. You mustn't be afraid of my dying. I've had a good life, and we all know it's going to happen. I maybe have four or five months."

  Come on, I said nervously. Nobody can say

  "I can," he said softly. "There's even a little test. A doctor showed me."

  A test?

  "Inhale a few times." I did as he said.

  "Now, once more, but this time, when you exhale, count as many numbers as you can before you take another breath."

  I quickly exhaled the numbers. "One-two-three-four-five-six-seven-eight . . ." I reached seventy before my breath was gone.

  "Good," Morrie said. "You have healthy lungs. Now. Watch what I do."

  He inhaled, then began his number count in a soft, wobbly voice. "One-two-three-four-five-six-seven-eight-nine-ten-eleven-twelve-thirteen-fourteen-fifteensixteen-seventeen-eighteen-"

  He stopped, gasping for air.

  "When the doctor first asked me to do this, I could reach twenty-three. Now it's eighteen."

  He closed his eyes, shook his head. "My tank is almost empty."

  I tapped my thighs nervously. That was enough for one afternoon.

  "Come back and see your old professor," Morrie said when I hugged him good-bye.

  I promised I would, and I tried not to think about the last time I promised this.

  In the campus bookstore, I shop for the items on Morrie's reading list. I purchase books that I never knew existed, titles such as Youth: Identity and Crisis, I and Thou, The Divided Self.

  Before college I did not know the study of human relations could be considered scholarly. Until I met Morrie, I did not believe it.

  But his passion for books is real and contagious. We begin to talk seriously sometimes, after class, when the room has emptied. He asks me questions about my life, then quotes lines from Erich Fromm, Martin Buber, Erik Erikson. Often he defers to their words, footnoting his own advice, even though he obviously thought the same things himself. It is at these times that I realize he is indeed a professor, not an uncle. One afternoon, I am complaining about the confusion of my age, what is expected of me versus what I want for myself.

  "Have I told you about the tension of opposites?" he says. The tension of opposites?

  "Life is a series of pulls back and forth. You want to do one thing, but you are bound to do something else. Something hurts you, yet you know it shouldn't. You take certain things for granted, even when you know you should never take anything for granted.

  "A tension of opposites, like a pull on a rubber band. And most of us live somewhere in the middle. "

  Sounds like a wrestling match, I say.

  "A wrestling match." He laughs. "Yes, you could describe life that way."

  So which side wins, I ask? " Which side wins?"

  He smiles at me, the crinkled eyes, the crooked teeth.

  "Love wins. Love always wins."

  Taking Attendance

  I flew to London a few weeks later. I was covering Wimbledon, the world's premier tennis competition and one of the few events I go to where the crowd never boos and no one is drunk in the parking lot. England was warm and cloudy, and each morning I walked the treelined streets near the tennis courts, passing teenagers cued up for leftover tickets and vendors selling strawberries and cream. Outside the gate was a newsstand that sold a halfdozen colorful British tabloids, featuring photos of topless women, paparazzi pictures of the royal family, horoscopes, sports, lottery contests, and a wee bit of actual news. Their top headline of the day was written on a small chalkboard that leaned against the latest stack of papers, and usually read something like DIANA IN ROW WITH CHARLES! or GAZZA TO TEAM: GIVE ME MILLIONS!

  People scooped up these tabloids, devoured their gossip, and on previous trips to England, I had always done the same. But now, for some reason, I found myself thinking about Morrie whenever I read anything silly or mindless. I kept picturing him there, in the house with the Japanese maple and the hardwood floors, counting his breath, squeezing out every moment with his loved ones, while I spent so many hours on things that meant absolutely nothing to me personally: movie stars, supermodels, the latest noise out of Princess Di or Madonna or John F. Kennedy, Jr. In a strange way, I envied the quality of Morrie's time even as I lamented its diminishing supply. Why did we, bother with all the distractions we did? Back home, the O. J. Simpson trial was in full swing, and there were people who surrendered their entire lunch hours watching it, then taped the rest so they could watch more at night. They didn't know O. J. Simpson. They didn't know anyone involved in the case. Yet they gave up days and weeks of their lives, addicted to someone else's drama.

  I remembered what Morrie said during our visit: "The culture we have does not make people feel good about themselves. And you have to be strong enough to say if the culture doesn't work, don't buy it."

  Morrie, true to these words, had developed his own culture-long before he got sick. Discussion groups, walks with friends, dancing to his music in the Harvard Square church. He started a project called Greenhouse, where poor people could receive mental health services. He read books to find new ideas for his classes, visited with colleagues, kept up with old students, wrote letters to distant friends. He took more time eating and looking at nature and wasted no time in front of TV sitcoms or "Movies of the Week." He had created a cocoon of human activities-conversation, interactio
n, affection-and it filled his life like an overflowing soup bowl.

  I had also developed my own culture. Work. I did four or five media jobs in England, juggling them like a clown. I spent eight hours a day on a computer, feeding my stories back to the States. Then I did TV pieces, traveling with a crew throughout parts of London. I also phoned in radio reports every morning and afternoon. This was not an abnormal load. Over the years, I had taken labor as my companion and had moved everything else to the side.

  In Wimbledon; I ate meals at my little wooden work cubicle and thought nothing of it. On one particularly crazy day, a crush of reporters had tried to chase down Andre Agassi and his famous girlfriend, Brooke Shields, and I had gotten knocked over by a British photographer who barely muttered "Sorry" before sweeping past, his huge metal lenses strapped around his neck. I thought of something else Morrie had told me: "So many people walk around with a meaningless life. They seem half-asleep, even when they're busy doing things they think are important. This is because they're chasing the wrong things. The way you get meaning into your life is to devote yourself to loving others, devote yourself to your community around you, and devote yourself to creating something that gives you purpose and meaning."

  I knew he was right.

  Not that I did anything about it.

  At the end of the tournament-and the countless cups of coffee I drank to get through it-I closed my computer, cleaned out my cubicle, and went back to the apartment to pack. It was late. The TV was nothing but fuzz.

  I flew to Detroit, arrived late in the afternoon, dragged myself home and went to sleep. I awoke to a jolting piece of news: the unions at my newspaper had gone on strike. The place was shut down. There were picketers at the front entrance and marchers chanting up and down the street. As a member of the union, I had no choice: I was suddenly, and for the first time in my life, out of a job, out of a paycheck, and pitted against my employers. Union leaders called my home and warned me against any contact with my former editors, many of whom were my friends, telling me to hang up if they tried to call and plead their case.

  "We're going to fight until we win!" the union leaders swore, sounding like soldiers.

  I felt confused and depressed. Although the TV and radio work were nice supplements, the newspaper had been my lifeline, my oxygen; when I saw my stories in print in each morning, I knew that, in at least one way, I was alive.

  Now it was gone. And as the strike continued-the first day, the second day, the third day-there were worried phone calls and rumors that this could go on for months. Everything I had known was upside down. There were sporting events each night that I would have gone to cover. Instead, I stayed home, watched them on TV. I had grown used to thinking readers somehow needed my column. I was stunned at how easily things went on without me.

  After a week of this, I picked up the phone and dialed Morrie's number. Connie brought him to the phone. "You're coming to visit me," he said, less a question than a statement.

  Well. Could I?

  "How about Tuesday?"

  Tuesday would be good, I said. Tuesday would be fine.

  In my sophomore year, I take two more of his courses. We go beyond the classroom, meeting now and then just to talk. I have never done this before with an adult who was not a relative, yet I feel comfortable doing it with Morrie, and he seems comfortable making the time.

  "Where shall we visit today?" he asks cheerily when I enter his office.

  In the spring, we sit under a tree outside the sociology building, and in the winter, we sit by his desk, me in my gray sweatshirts and Adidas sneakers, Morrie in Rockport shoes and corduroy pants. Each time we talk, lie listens to me ramble, then he tries to pass on some sort of life lesson. He warns me that money is not the most important thing, contrary to the popular view on campus. He tells me I need to be "fully human." He speaks of the alienation of youth and the need for "connectedness" with the society around me. Some of these things I understand, some I do not. It makes no difference. The discussions give me an excuse to talk to him, fatherly conversations I cannot have with my own father, who would like me to be a lawyer.

  Morrie hates lawyers.

  "What do you want to do when you get out of college?" he asks.

  I want to be a musician, I say. Piano player. "Wonderful," he says. "But that's a hard life." Yeah.

  "A lot of sharks." That's what I hear.

  "Still," he says, "if you really want it, then you'll make your dream happen. "

  I want to hug him, to thank him for saying that, but I am not that open. I only nod instead.

  "I'll bet you play piano with a lot of pep," he says. I laugh. Pep?

  He laughs back. "Pep. What's the matter? They don't say that anymore?"

  The First Tuesday We Talk About the World

  Connie opened the door and let me in. Morrie was in his wheelchair by the kitchen table, wearing a loose cotton shirt and even looser black sweatpants. They were loose because his legs had atrophied beyond normal clothing size-you could get two hands around his thighs and have your fingers touch. Had he been able to stand, he'd have been no more than five feet tall, and he'd probably have fit into a sixth grader's jeans.

  "I got you something," I announced, holding up a brown paper bag. I had stopped on my way from the airport at a nearby supermarket and purchased some turkey, potato salad, macaroni salad, and bagels. I knew there was plenty of food at the house, but I wanted to contribute something. I was so powerless to help Morrie otherwise. And I remembered his fondness for eating.

  "Ah, so much food!" he sang. "Well. Now you have to eat it with me."

  We sat at the kitchen table, surrounded by wicker chairs. This time, without the need to make up sixteen years of information, we slid quickly into the familiar waters of our old college dialogue, Morrie asking questions, listening to my replies, stopping like a chef to sprinkle in something I'd forgotten or hadn't realized. He asked about the newspaper strike, and true to form, he couldn't understand why both sides didn't simply communicate with each other and solve their problems. I told him not everyone was as smart as he was.

  Occasionally, he had to stop to use the bathroom, a process that took some time. Connie would wheel him to the toilet, then lift him from the chair and support him as he urinated into the beaker. Each time he came back, he looked tired.

  "Do you remember when I told Ted Koppel that pretty soon someone was gonna have to wipe my ass?" he said.

  I laughed. You don't forget a moment like that. "Well, I think that day is coming. That one bothers me."

  Why?

  "Because it's the ultimate sign of dependency. Someone wiping your bottom. But I'm working on it. I'm trying to enjoy the process."

  Enjoy it?

  "Yes. After all, I get to be a baby one more time." That's a unique way of looking at it.

  "Well, I have to look at life uniquely now. Let's face it. I can't go shopping, I can't take care of the bank accounts, I can't take out the garbage. But I can sit here with my dwindling days and look at what I think is important in life. I have both the time-and the reason-to do that."

  So, I said, in a reflexively cynical response, I guess the key to finding the meaning of life is to stop taking out the garbage?

  He laughed, and I was relieved that he did.

  As Connie took the plates away, I noticed a stack of newspapers that had obviously been read before I got there.

  You bother keeping up with the news, I asked? "Yes," Morrie said. "Do you think that's strange? Do you think because I'm dying, I shouldn't care what happens in this world?"

  Maybe.

  He sighed. "Maybe you're right. Maybe I shouldn't care. After all, I won't be around to see how it all turns out.

  "But it's hard to explain, Mitch. Now that I'm suffering, I feel closer to people who suffer than I ever did before. The other night, on TV, I saw people in Bosnia running across the street, getting fired upon, killed, innocent victims . . . and I just started to cry. I feel their anguish as if i
t were my own. I don't know any of these people. But-how can I put this?-I'm almost . . . drawn to them."

  His eyes got moist, and I tried to change the subject, but he dabbed his face and waved me off.

  "I cry all the time now," he said. "Never mind."