Blog 18

Ted Koppel had come back for Morrie's last interview. He had called many times before and asked, "Do you think you can handle it?" Morrie was sure he could.

 Koppel sat down on the chair in Morrie's study. They started talking about the disease's progression and death. Morrie told Koppel of his latest aphorism: "Don't let go too soon, but don't hang on too long."
 Near the end of the interview, the camera zoomed in on Morrie and Ted. It was the last few minutes of
the interview, almost like Morrie's final words. "Be compassionate," Morrie told him. "And take responsibility for each other. If we only learned those lessons, this world would be so much a better place." The interview was over.
"You did a good job," Koppel added, looking close to tears.
 "Ted, this disease is knocking at my spirit. But it will not get my spirit. It will get my body. Not my spirit."
 "You've done good." Koppel smiled.

  A few days after Morrie's "Nightline" interview, we sat in his study on the rainy, dreary day. It was the twelfth Tuesday. How did time fly by so fast?
 He started off our conversation by talking about forgiveness. "Mitch, there is no point in keeping vengeance or stubornness. These things I so regret in my life. Pride. Why do we do the things we do?"
 Morrie told me a story about his friend, Norman, who made a sculpture of him a few years back. Norman and his wife moved away to Chicago. Not much later, Morrie's wife Charlotte had to have a serious operation, but they never called or sent an email. No contact. They were hurt. Over the next few years, Norman tried to apologize and make contact with us again, but we never responded. Morrie and Charlotte didn't want to accept his apology.
 A few years later, Norman died of cancer. They never got to see him. They hadn't really talked with Norman since Charlotte's operation. They felt so sad.
After Morrie told the story, Morrie started crying.
"It's not just other people we need to forgive, Mitch," he said. "We also need to forgive ourselves. For all the things we didn't do. You can't get stuck on the regrets of what should have happened."
Morrie dabbed his tears with a tissue and went on.