a great read | Tuesdays with Morrie

First, I have to confess – I’m not not an avid reader. I wish I was. I hear myself tell my kids how important it is to read and even give them reading logs, etc. But I’m just not a great reader. My mom and sister are – they exchange books with each other all the time. My dad was a high school english & history teacher. I should have it in my bones! My husband breezes through books – and same with our oldest. I know they are all the smarter for it too.

Once in a while I get the reading bug. The only bad thing about this is that it becomes all-consuming for me. I can’t do anything else but read that book. So it’s all or nothing for me, the non-reader. The book I’m reading now is Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom. I’m sure a lot of you have heard of it. It’s not a new book and I have actually read it before. I was given this book by one of my dearest friends who I have known since we were about 5 years old. (She is now a teacher which is appropriate since this book is about life’s lessons a teacher tries to teach his students). It was about 15 years ago when my friends and I were all starting to settle down and she and I decided to meet on the first Tuesday of every month just to catch up. She called it Tuesdays with Lori – so clever! Our get-togethers were definitely not as profound as Mitch and Morrie’s. We didn’t contemplate life’s lessons, but we did laugh. A lot. And more than anything, we made the time for each other. Something I don’t think happens enough these days. And I’m as guilty of that as anyone. And as Morrie teaches Mitch, we are often too busy, too over scheduled, trying to make more money, work harder, work longer, get a bigger house, a bigger car, and so on. We’re missing out on what’s really important. We’re clinging to temporary things. We’re not involved.

I can’t pretend to do the book justice. I think depending on where you are in your life, you’ll take something different from this book. But I recommend it to anyone, any age (my 13 year old is reading it too), and even if you have read it before. It’s a great lesson – one that we easily forget as we go about our busy lives. Get involved in your life. And there’s no such thing as “too late.”

Here’s a quote by Henry Adams that was in the book. Since I’m from a family of teachers (Mom, Dad, Father-in-law, Uncle), it means a lot to me: “A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops.” And Morrie sounded like one amazing teacher!

Order the book here.