29. Tuesdays with Morrie

Posted by T. T. and P. R. in June 2019

Morie Schwartz (1916-1995) was a Professor of sociology at Brandeis University, Massachusetts. In his seventies, health problems appeared and his illness was finally diagnosed as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The doctor told him that it is terminal and guessed that he had two years left.

With this news, Morrie thought deeply about how to live in the remaining days of his life. He wrote many aphorisms about living near death; for example, “Learn to forgive yourself and to forgive others”. He shared them with his friends, and an article about his aphorisms appeared in the Boston Globe newspaper. Then, the host of the  popular TV show “Night-line”, Ted Koppel, visited Morrie’s home for an interview, and Morrie then appeared on this show.

A student of Morrie, Mitch Albom, happened to watch the show. While he didn’t know about Morrie’s fatal illness, he called Morrie, and dashed to his home immediately. Morrie accepted Mitch as his student once again, and suggested that he should come on Tuesday. Thereafter, Mitch visited Morrie on Tuesdays, fourteen times in all,  till just before his death. On every visit, Morrie and Mitch talked about various topics of life. The most important thing in life, Morrie told to Mitch, was to learn how to give out love, and how to let it come in.

At present, our world is almost the same as a patient suffering from a fatal illness. To diagnose the illness correctly and try to cure it is a very urgent matter. It will not be improbable that the time left to our humankind is fairly short. However, present people do not think about how to live in those precious days that remain. What is important is not the length of the period but its quality. As Morrie said, we have to learn how to give out love, and how to let it come in.

Morrie’s story above is taken from a nonfiction publication entitled “Tuesdays with Morrie”, written by Mitch Albom and published by Broadway Books in 1997. The book topped the New York Times Non-Fiction Bestsellers in 2000. If some readers inspired by Morrie’s attitude facing a sentence of death, and then seriously thought about their own attitude facing the end of the existence of humankind, Mitch’s success as a bestselling writer will be a reasonable reward for his contributions to future generations.

28. Happy-to-be-alive Exhibition

Posted by T. T. and P. R. in June 2019

More than 50 years have passed since implantable cardiac pacemakers were introduced to treat heart arrhythmias. Since then, many patients having serious arrhythmias became alive again and recovered their normal life, sustained by an implanted cardiac pacemaker. An Association, whose members were patients having had an implanted cardiac pacemaker, was established in Japan in 1970.

At some time, the President of the Association, Professor Toshio Mitsui, suffered a serious haemorrhage from the intestine. After enduring a critical state for several weeks, he finally recovered, returned to his home, requested raw tuna and beer, enjoyed them both, and felt so happy to be alive.

©Toshio Mitsui (2017)

After this experience, he had the idea to establish a “Happy-to-be-alive Exhibition”. He asked some Association members to give a short talk in the annual general meeting about their own happy-to-be-alive experience. In the event, members presented their own experiences on different occasions, and the audience congratulated  them and shared their experiences. Now, the Happy-to-be-alive Exhibition has become a regular part of the annual meeting, and reports are published regularly in the members’ magazine.

After the current major environmental crisis, which has been of our own making, people living in the future may well feel the reality of being “happy-to-be-alive”, as they remember repeatedly being told of the human history in which their distant ancestors destroyed nature down to the level where the very existence of the human race had been endangered. The following generations had to endure many painful hardships, for several millenniums or even millions of years, merely to ensure the  survival of humankind. Then, once destroyed, nature gradually recovered  and, finally, the richness of the biosphere returned up to the level it was before the Industrial Revolution.

People living in the remote future will surely recognize the virtues and benefits of being alive, surrounded by the profound cultural achievements sustained by advanced science and technology. They will also recognize the importance of providing contributions to the people in the further remote future. Actually, experiencing the happy-to-be-alive feeling is not merely a personal episode for each individual, as it will become a compassion among all generations including the past, present and future through the whole lifetime of humankind.