Ep 745 - Tuesdays with Morrie, by Mitch Albom

Summary

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Overdue Ep 745

Book: Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom
Hosts: Andrew and Craig
Date: March 9, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode of Overdue delves into Mitch Albom's immensely popular memoir, Tuesdays with Morrie, which recounts the author’s real-life reconnection with his old professor, Morrie Schwartz, as the latter faces the end of his life due to ALS. Andrew and Craig talk through the book’s themes, explore the personalities of both Albom and Schwartz, and reflect on the memoir's pop-culture impact and legacy. With a mixture of wit, skepticism, and sincerity, they pull apart the book’s "life lesson" ethos, plus how it lands with readers today.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Background on Mitch Albom & Publication Context (10:07-22:07)

• Mitch Albom's Career:
  Albom started as a sportswriter (Detroit Free Press), and later wrote opinion/life columns. He's still a prolific journalist, though the episode notes his tendency to avoid expressing strong opinions:
  • "[His] role is to not add or subtract anything and take himself totally out of the equation...but also is literally impossible." — Andrew (24:35)
• Journalistic Scandal:
  Discussed Albom’s 2005 journalistic slip, where he inaccurately pre-wrote athletes’ attendance at a basketball game—drawing significant industry backlash (12:01-16:43).
  • "I was reading about this because all you have to do is just dig into a bunch of sports columns from 20 years ago." — Craig (13:21)
• Book’s Origin:
  Albom saw Schwartz on TV (Nightline) discussing his impending death, prompting Albom to reconnect. The idea for the memoir came as a way to help pay Morrie’s medical bills—a fact underlined more directly in later editions.
  • "He writes this book based on conversations he has with Maury Schwartz... to help pay Schwartz’s medical expenses as he is dying of this illness." — Andrew (18:26)

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Tuesdays with Morrie: Structure & Key Influences (29:53-34:11)

• Memoir Format:
  The book is a blend of present-day narrative (Mitch’s weekly visits) and italicized vignettes from the past. The "class" with Maury stands as the central metaphor: "The last class with my old professor."
• Morrie’s Persona:
  Charismatic, left-leaning, and known for nurturing mentorship. Maury’s aphorisms were collected before his death and appeared in the press, leading to media attention that brought Albom back into his life.
  • “Learn what we can before we have to say goodbye.” — Craig (33:46)

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The Book’s Thematic Core & the Hosts' Critique

The Self-Help Angle vs. Genuine Wisdom (33:38-39:25)

• Comparison to Self-Help:
  The hosts agree that, while Morrie’s reflections are heartfelt, their presentation often feels familiar—especially to readers raised on the boom of the genre post-2000:
  • “None of it’s bad, none of it’s unhelpful. None of it is like a stroke of rhetoric or anything...but it does, from watching some of the Nightline footage, have an extra power when you're actually... hearing this very exuberant, engaging, charismatic person say this stuff.” — Craig (36:20)
• Authenticity Question:
  They note the possible tension between Morrie-as-person and the “Oprah’s Book Club”-branded school of self-help, seeing the former as more grounded.

Individualism vs. Societal Critique (40:05-44:17)

• Critique of Memoir’s Scope:
  The hosts highlight how most of the book’s advice centers on individual acts and perspective changes, rather than systemic issues—especially striking given the context of Morrie's escalating medical expenses:
  • "It's not quite too individualistic…I don't disagree with Maury [about the culture], but as filtered through Albom, it seems to be: what can I, the individual, learn from?" — Andrew (41:34)
  • "I think it's a missed opportunity …to say, like, this guy is running up incredible medical debt. What can we do to ensure that his wife isn't destitute…?" — Craig (42:16)
• Possible Limitations of Albom:
  The hosts feel that the book sometimes misses a chance to grapple with broader social realities, partially because of Albom’s detached, “view from nowhere” journalism style:
  • “It’s the specific kind of view from nowhere that drives me up a wall because…usually what it amounts to is: the people who are doing the atrocities and the people who are upset about the atrocities are both equally bad.” — Andrew (23:35)
  • "I found it frustrating that it was a throwaway thing at the end of the book [that royalties helped pay for care]." — Craig (39:55)

The “Mitch Problem” – Mediator or Detraction? (44:17-50:15)

• Mitch's Character in the Book:
  Albom’s own narrative voice, marked by privilege and detachment, often distracts from the book’s emotional core:
  • “...if you can't do it, guess whose fault it is.” — Andrew (42:14)
  • "[Mitch] doesn’t have to go to work because there’s a strike on and he’s not on the picket line, so..." — Craig (50:54)
• Notable, Wry Critique:
  “Imagine Mitch being on the picket line with a handwritten cardboard sign that says, ‘Everyone's making good points.’”— Andrew (51:04)

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Memorable Moments & Quotes

• Maury’s Central Lessons:
  “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.” — Maury (53:14)
• On Mortality:
  “Once you learn to die, you learn how to live. That’s Maury’s whole thing.” — Craig (56:13)
• On Aging and Envy:
  “I have been all of those ages. All of those ages are me. So in any moment where I feel myself just being a little envious of somebody younger than me, I can just think about what it was like when I was there…” — Paraphrased from Maury (60:16)
• On Culture & Materialism:
  “People embrace material things when what they really need is tenderness or camaraderie… Share your talents with the world. Giving is better than receiving.” — Maury (61:18)
• On Building Small Communities in a Flawed World:
  “Build a community of people you love and who love you. You can build a little corner of the world that is better than the world at large…” — Maury (64:02)
• On the Book’s Purpose:
  “We hope the readers find a piece of themselves in us. Every son who had a father, every student who had a teacher…The payoff is how to die with peace about how you’ve lived.” — Albom, quoting the pitch for the book (67:05)

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Segment Timestamps

• Book & Albom Background: 10:07–27:11
• Structure & Memoir Details: 29:53–34:11
• Self-Help Critique: 36:20–39:25
• Maury’s Lessons: 53:14; 56:13; 60:16; 61:18; 64:02
• Reflecting on Albom’s Style: 23:35; 41:34; 50:54; 51:04
• Conclusion and Book’s Impact: 67:05–68:20

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Tone and Rapport

The episode strikes a balance between warm banter and earnest critique. Andrew and Craig bring their dry, self-aware humor to their exploration of the book, with running jokes about paternity test reveals (early Maury Povich riffing at 04:08) and charming asides about 90s technology (renting cell phones, faxes, etc.). Underneath, however, is a genuine inquiry into what makes Tuesdays with Morrie enduring, as well as the shortcomings they see in how its lessons reach readers.

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Takeaways for Listeners

• Tuesdays with Morrie succeeds for many because of Morrie Schwartz’s charisma and genuine, non-doctrinaire wisdom about mortality, love, and community.
• The hosts find the book’s advice heartfelt but sometimes generic, and critique how its popular interpretation often ends up reinforcing individualistic solutions to problems that are also systemic.
• Albom’s memoir can be moving, especially for those looking for guidance through grief or facing loss—but it may feel limited for readers seeking more pointed social or political observance.
• Listening to Morrie directly (as in the original Nightline footage) may have more impact than the memoir's somewhat distanced writing style.

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Notable Final Thoughts

• On the enduring appeal:
  “…how Maury might kind of be a stand-in for other people in your life or folks that you wish were in your life. And you would then kind of connect the lessons to that. So that’s Tuesdays with Morrie. Thanks, Oprah, for making it a book we’ve all heard about before.” — Craig (68:20)
• On the show’s mission:
  Overdue continues to explore not only what makes a book last, but also what happens when mass appeal runs into the messy, individual work of searching for meaning.

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For further information, feedback, or to share whether you listened to this episode on a Tuesday, reach out at [e-mail] or @overduepod.

Transcript

[Andrew]

This is a Headgun podcast.

[Craig]

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[Andrew]

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[Craig]

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[Andrew]

Craig, this episode of Overdue is brought to you by Marley Spoon. When I am left to my own devices, I fall into a meal rut. The same half dozen easy to make things just in a continuous loop forever. There are stretches where I get to dinner time and I think to myself, I cannot believe I have to eat again. But I recently tried the Marley Spoon meal delivery box for the first time and it was like my eyes had been opened. In a very real way. Marley Spoon helped to save my household from the curse of I guess we'll do taco night. And I thank them for that. Craig, I know you've tried Marley Spoon too. Can you tell me some. Tell them some stuff that you like about it.

[Craig]

Well, let me first remind you that our relationship to food changes constantly. We are all evolving, Andrew, and Marley Spoon is evolving with you. Like a little pocket monster. A pocket monster hungry. To help you enjoy food and be efficient with your time, I started taking cooking more seriously. A few years ago and Marley Spoon was, was a huge part of that. They've got a wide range of recipes and prepared meals that help you evolve into a more adventurous foodie and chef. I recently made a delicious caprese chicken and farro bowl for me and my wife a couple of years ago. I'm not sure I knew what farro was and here I am making a tasty bowl full of it. Thanks, Marley Spoon.

[Andrew]

If any of this sounds good to you at home, you hungry listeners at home, go to marley spoon.com offer overdue for up to 25 free meals. That's right. Up to 25 free meals with Marley Spoon. That's marleyspoon.com offer overdue for up to25 free meals.

[Craig]

While Andrew and Craig believe the joy of discovery is crucial to enjoying any well told tale, they will not shy away from spoiling specific story beats when necessary. Plus, these are books you should have read by now. Hey everybody, welcome to Overdue. It's a podcast about the books you've been meaning to read. My name is Craig.

[Andrew]

My name is Andrew Craig. I'm so sorry to do this to you live on the. Oh, but our producers, they've handed me, I've got an envelope here moonlight that our producers.

[Craig]

The winner is moonlight and Craig.

[Andrew]

I'm just looking at this envelope in the case of 67 year old author Mitch Albom, author of Tuesdays with Maury. You are not the father. Oh wow. Craig is. Now he's not doing it on microphone but he's doing a lot of cartwheels and like celebratory dancing like I'm on

[Craig]

the Ellen show, another show that everybody

[Andrew]

watches how he's not the author. The, the father of 67 year old

[Craig]

the author of Tuesdays.

[Andrew]

And that's the only Maury Povich joke I have in the. I don't really in the hopper what

[Craig]

Maury's deal was other than that because

[Andrew]

the TV show he did the not the father stuff. I just think of him as the, as the man who took people's like suffering and mess and made it fun. It's fun.

[Craig]

Yeah, but he wasn't doing fun to watch. He wasn't doing, he wasn't going as far as Springer was is the thing.

[Andrew]

See, I don't know. That's, that's beyond what I know about him. Yeah, I know like 5 minute and 45 second like Maury Povich best not the father reels on YouTube.

[Craig]

Yeah, I think Jerry Springer was willing to have more fights on stage than Maury was, I think.

[Andrew]

Well I mean at least on the, on the reels that I've watched in preparation for doing that bit.

[Craig]

Uh huh, sure.

[Andrew]

It seems like mostly the men who have been exonerated do a, do a little dance because these are all. This is always like this preface with like what, like 15 or 20 minutes of just like back and forth between

[Craig]

him and whoever of making a relationship look awful. Yeah, yeah.

[Andrew]

And then the person whose child the man is not the father of sort of runs from the stage in embarrassment. That's the normal.

[Craig]

That's the normal way TV is better now is an unassailable statement that I just made.

[Andrew]

Is it better than what?

[Craig]

Good question.

[Andrew]

Every week one of us reads a book that neither of us have read before. Sometimes we do a little like a, like a name based pun wordplay thing.

[Craig]

Free association.

[Andrew]

Sometimes we don't. But yeah, we always, but we always talk about the book. And this week Craig read Mitch Albom's Tuesdays with Maury.

[Craig]

We do always talk about the book.

[Andrew]

We always get around to talking about the book.

[Craig]

I've never read this book before before reading it for the show for this week on our podcast. Yes.

[Andrew]

So Mondays on overdue, Tuesdays with Maury.

[Craig]

Yeah, it's possible. In high school. No, that was Marvin's Room. That's a play. That's different. I do think I saw Tuesdays on Tuesdays with Maury, the stage adaptation like on a shelf in high school drama class.

[Andrew]

But I thought you were gonna say that you had seen it.

[Craig]

No, I had not.

[Andrew]

But no you, but no, you saw the, you saw the screenplay?

[Craig]

I think I saw the Squish. Yeah.

[Andrew]

No, it was a screenplay version of it that Mitch album wrote.

[Craig]

Yeah, that's true. We'll talk about that also.

[Andrew]

Also a TV movie. Now when Mitch Album says that he's. That he has written things that have been turned into Emmy award winning television movies, he is talking mainly about this.

[Craig]

Mostly about this. He also is talking about it was

[Andrew]

produced by Oprah and it was starring Hank Azaria, also known as Mo from the Simpsons as Mitch Album.

[Craig]

He's a very talented actor. Also Jack Lemmon as Maury.

[Andrew]

Sure. Yeah.

[Craig]

It was Jack Lemmon's final on screen performance, I believe. Very well regarded.

[Andrew]

I think Hank Azaria's reaction to not doing the voice of Apu on the Simpsons anymore was better than like the show writ largest reaction.

[Craig]

I think Hank's a good guy.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

So let's. I Andrew you, do you know anything about this book like coming before you started researching for the episode, like I say the title, Tuesdays with Mori.

[Andrew]

For some reason, it makes me think of my dinner with Andre. I don't know why.

[Craig]

I think it's like, okay, fair. Yes. The word.

[Andrew]

The word with. And a vague sense that it happened

[Craig]

in the 90s with a guy. Yeah.

[Andrew]

And that's what it is.

[Craig]

I was coming into putting this on the calendar. I had like a metaphorical coin with this and the five people you meet in heaven on it. Which is the first work of fiction that Mitch Albom wrote. And I asked our associate Megan which one I should do in based on name recognition. And she said Tuesdays with Maury. And I think she was. I agree with her assessment.

[Andrew]

Yeah, she's usually got pretty good judgment.

[Craig]

Which does mean this is the first time in a while that we're doing memoir rather than fiction. We tend not to do too much non fiction on the show. This is an interesting case of memoir because it is about another. It is not like autobiographical memoir.

[Andrew]

Right. But I also don't think it's like full on the secret, how to win friends and influence people. Like, here are a bunch of anecdotes that may or may not be made up.

[Craig]

No.

[Andrew]

Based on things that I learned from my inspirational professor. It is, right?

[Craig]

No, it is not that though. It. There is like, what? There are some chapters where he is kind of recount. Where Mitch is recounting Maury's appearances on Nightline. And I did watch some of the Nightline clips. And I'm like, oh, yeah, that's just in the book. And like, I. Yeah, that's fine. That's Mitch's prerogative.

[Andrew]

I don't read a lot of books that are just about a guy. And like some TV he watched one time. I mean, I guess the Mr. Burns book.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

That I read a long time ago is basically that I heard that they

[Craig]

might be making that into a movie. I don't know how that's gonna work. Anyway.

[Andrew]

Okay. All right.

[Craig]

Anyway.

[Andrew]

Tell me what a movie of people trying to remember what reading the book was like. They should hire me to direct.

[Craig]

Oh, that's good. And you have to not know how a camera works also. You have to figure it out on the fly. We're going to talk about Mitch, we're going to talk about Maury, we're going to talk about Tuesdays. Here we go.

[Andrew]

That's pretty much all of it. Yeah. Mitch Albom not born to Craig.

[Craig]

Nope.

[Andrew]

In the father, not the father, Gotta love me. He's An American author. He's a sports writer. He began working. Okay. According to his website, his books have sold 42 million copies worldwide.

[Craig]

20 million of them, I think, are this book.

[Andrew]

Yes. As of 2022, Library of Congress piece, I had 17 and a half million.

[Craig]

Okay.

[Andrew]

So, you know, maybe it's continued selling in the years since. I don't know where that 20 comes from, but yeah. He started working as a reporter for the Queen's Tribune. As a night job he went. And then he went to J school at Columbia. He freelances for a few publications after this, including Sports Illustrated and our own Philadelphia Inquirer.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

He takes over as a sports columnist for the Detroit Free Press in 1985.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

And he's still. He is still doing that. He. He's still writing for the Detroit Free Press, whatever that organization looks like now. I think it's by the USA Today people.

[Craig]

And he was also, not long after getting that sports gig, given a weekly non sports column. Just kind of a life and thoughts column. Right.

[Andrew]

Yeah, he still, he still has that.

[Craig]

Okay, great.

[Andrew]

Yeah. So the Detroit Free Press, he primarily writes about sports still. He also gets into some opinion stuff. We'll talk about that in a little bit.

[Craig]

Okay.

[Andrew]

Several of his columns have been gathered into books. It's starting with the book live album one in 1988.

[Craig]

These are.

[Andrew]

And then ending. And then ending with the book live album 4.

[Craig]

It's a funny name.

[Andrew]

It is a. It's funny naming convention. It's always a huge swing to name the first thing of something.

[Craig]

Number one.

[Andrew]

One.

[Craig]

Yeah. Fair.

[Andrew]

Because you are calling a shot there.

[Craig]

But that was. That was the newspaper. I think that was probably the newspaper was like, we could sell this as a book maybe. Sure.

[Andrew]

He got in a little trouble with the paper in 2005. There's some very weird, like you can scandal that seems very quaint. Let me now where like.

[Craig]

Yes, he.

[Andrew]

So he files a piece on a Friday saying that two, like basketball players are going to be in attendance at an NCAA basketball game.

[Craig]

They were alums of the school. One of the schools playing, I think Michigan State maybe.

[Andrew]

And this. So these, these players had told him that they were going to be at the game. And so he files the piece Friday, he knocks off the game, happens Saturday, the piece goes up on Sunday. And it turns out these young men had changed their plans and not gone to the game.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

And Mitch Albom had not, even though he was at the game, had not verified whether they had been there or not.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

And so he and four Other editors got briefly suspended about that.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

And the publisher of the paper at the time, Carol Lee Hutton, did later say she thought that it had been overblown, but just like a weird. Just a weird thing, a weird scandal.

[Craig]

I was.

[Andrew]

And like, yeah, ideally, you shouldn't say stuff happen before you have confirmed that they happen.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

Also, I was reading something about, like, boys attend basketball game. Seems so low stakes to create a kerfuffle like this.

[Craig]

It is.

[Andrew]

No. Who, like, I don't even know who noticed that and, like, called attention.

[Craig]

So I was reading about it.

[Andrew]

The historical record doesn't say, but I

[Craig]

was reading about this because all you have to do is like, just dig into a bunch of sports columns from. From 20 years ago. There's a piece in LA Times from David Shaw in 2005 how one careless act became a really big deal. And he even points out, David does that. A lot of the folks who got their pitchforks out for Mitch were other sports writers.

[Andrew]

Sure.

[Craig]

And I also read a CNN order interview that included one of the guys from Pardon the Interruption on espn. Like, everybody was talking about this.

[Andrew]

And I know from listening to that Roger Ebert miniseries podcast that all newspaper columnists at the time all hated each other's guts.

[Craig]

Yeah. Well, we can. We can also talk about Mitch's. Mitch at. By this point, he's 10 years from Tuesdays with Maury. He's had a lot of national success even before that book. So some of the coverage is like, oh, there's a target on his back. People don't like him because he's successful. He made a mistake. Obviously, they should have caught it. But people are coming for him because they want to get him. The. The LA Times piece. The guy also argues, like, this is a. An industry where we're all, like, even 20 years ago, like, we're all just hanging in there by a thread. Our collective credibility could be shredded at any moment. Anybody who, like, does anything untoward is, you know, an attack against the rest of us. In 2004, there was a big scandal with this guy named Jack Kelly, who had been caught fabricating stories as a sports journalist. And this is two years after this guy, Jason Blair for the New York Times was disgraced for, like, plagiarism and fabrication for, like, stories, including the Beltway Sniper and, like, all sorts. So there's.

[Andrew]

I think that's pretty bad. I feel. I feel like generally, you know, the people shouldn't. Reporters should not fabricate quotes for stories.

[Craig]

Yes. I think that's probably not a thing.

[Andrew]

I feel Comfortable going on there.

[Craig]

I think that is a fair thing to say. And so there's another thing in that L. A Times piece where Hutton when asked by the writer David Shaw about, you know, her statement and then apparently the Detroit Free Press killed a negative review of five people you meet. Well, because they, after they like got the review and they're like, well we, we spend a lot of money to make a lot of money on this guy. Probably not great if we just like run a negative review of his book. So let's just not run it.

[Andrew]

So that's. I mean that's a journalistic scandal. You got catch and kill reviews of Mitch albums books.

[Craig]

So I think it's weird. It's a weird story in. Even in the moment people were wondering whether or not it should have been a story. I think it's pretty clear to say what should have happened. Which is one of his editors should have been like, hey, just put it in the. Like what is, you know, the tenses. Subjunctive. What, what's the like conditional tense. Some sort of like they plan to be there. They hope to be there cheering on their mates.

[Andrew]

Yeah. But then it looks weird if you publish it the day after it happens.

[Craig]

Yeah, well, they planned, they told me they planned to be. I don't know. Just don't write that part of the story.

[Andrew]

Pre writing is a. Is an accepted pract. I do it a lot based on like stuff that we think we know about stuff is going to happen. It just saves time not to have to put the words on the page. Like every obituary for every major figure that you've ever read has probably been pre written. Like I think that, I think we

[Craig]

know people who have pre written obits. Yeah.

[Andrew]

Like yes, yes. Like it's a thing. But then you have to make sure that the stuff that you guessed does not end up making it into the. Into the article.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

It's a bigger deal in print than it is on the much bigger deal. We can just kind of corrected and not have to worry about having to chase down everyone who read your thing the first time and giving them another thing to read. Anyway, album's first book, aside from the live album stuff, comes out in 1989. It's a biography of Miami university and University of Michigan football coach Bo Schem Beckler. Great name that he wrote with Shem Beckler's help.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

And another book about NCAA basketball players. Both become New York Times bestsellers. But his moment comes with Tuesdays with Maury.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

He has written this book based on conversations. This is 1997. I think this book comes out.

[Craig]

When it comes out. The events of the book are 1995.

[Andrew]

The events of the book are 95. Yeah. He writes this book based on conversations he has with Maury Schwartz, who is a former professor of albums who had been diagnosed with als. The story that they tell goes that album saw an interview with Schwartz on Nightline. You alluded to that. I think you.

[Craig]

Probably all in the book.

[Andrew]

Yeah, yeah. Which prompted Albom to reach out. And then the book is sourced mostly from 14 discussions that he had with Schwartz not in the hospital, because I

[Craig]

think Schwartz wanted to be treated at home.

[Andrew]

And. Yeah. And Albom conceives of this book in part to help pay for Schwartz's medical expenses as he is dying of this illness. This book blows up as many. I'll just blow through the rest of the stuff. The book blows up as many books do because of appearance on Oprah's show Love her. Love it or hate It. And who's to say what the net effect of Oprah recommendations has been on society writ large. But she does know how to move word bricks.

[Craig]

That's one way to put it.

[Andrew]

You gotta move word bricks. And then as a result of this, he keeps doing his sports writing. But as a result of that book, people start to kind of seek him out as a sort of authority on love and loss, grief. And since then, he's done a bunch of novels and other nonfiction books, often centered on his faith. Five people you meet in heaven is like the biggest, biggest one, but he's got a bunch of them. And yeah, that has been what most of his published book work has been since Tuesday with the Mori came out. He's written a stage adaptation of it. He wrote something called Hockey the musical where God decides that there are too many sports and we have to get rid of one. And it's hockey. And then hockey players have to beg God not to get rid of hockey.

[Craig]

Interesting.

[Andrew]

Does sound. Which does sound funny.

[Craig]

Yeah, it does sound funny. I have not like, for as much as I love sports, I am not a sports columnist guy. I have like one baseball writer whose newsletter I subscribe to. No, no, no. I will recommend it, though. Cup of coffee with Craig Calcatera. Not just because he's a Craig, but also because he's a Craig.

[Andrew]

Yeah, Craig solidarity.

[Craig]

It's a very good newsletter. And he. It's not on Substack, which is a plus. But so I like, don't really have a frame of reference for Mitch Albom as A writer outside of, you know, this book. And what I've like hearing about five to five people you meet in heaven and kind of thinking about him more as a. As an Oprah writer, as like a guy that Oprah brought on is like, oh, you wrote this book that made people feel feelings. And then they made it into some successful movie that made people feel feelings.

[Andrew]

I feel like there's an archetype of an Oprah writer, though, who's like. Like they didn't do anything before their Oprah book. And everything they've done since their Oprah book has just been like variations on a theme.

[Craig]

Yeah, sure.

[Andrew]

Like with the secrets got like the power and all that other stuff that all basically is the same law of attraction and mumbo jumbo. But.

[Craig]

And all. You can look at this book too, and like the. The best read of Mitch in this book is of a go go 90s guy, you know, reconnecting with his not quite hippie professor in his profess.

[Andrew]

Him. It teaches him something about life.

[Craig]

Yeah. Who teaches him to like about.

[Andrew]

About slowing down and enjoying what you've got.

[Craig]

It is easy to reduce this book, I think, to kind of pablum.

[Andrew]

I just did.

[Craig]

Yeah, I know. It was really. It was really easy. It was, it's. It's incredibly easy. And we'll talk about how that worked for me and didn't work for me. So, no, I have not really. Like, I can't come here with any sort of big endorsements about Mitch's writing as a journalist. I've skimmed through some of his recent writing on current events. I don't agree with all of what he's written.

[Andrew]

It's really interesting that you found work where you could disagree with the, the points that he was making, because everything that I read on his website that he just kind of syndicates his feed from the Detroit Free Press, basically.

[Craig]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Andrew]

And all the, like, I didn't really check on the sports stuff, but all the like, opinion like Slice of Life

[Craig]

columns, are they kind of nothing?

[Andrew]

They're just like going out of their way not to express an opinion about something. Here's. He wrote this one about the new food pyramid that RFK Juniors FDA put out.

[Craig]

Okay.

[Andrew]

So the 2026 version puts protein, dairy, healthy fats and vegetables at the top and grains in the basement. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The new health and Human Services Secretary, apparently had major input on this list. He told the media it represented the most significant reset of federal nutrition policy in history. Maybe. But when I read it, it only confirms What I have long believed. Nothing generates more opinions in this country than what you should eat. And the whole rest of the piece. The whole rest of the piece is just like some people think you is you should eat like this. And some people think you should eat like this. Whoa. Wild, huh? I don't have an opinion on this, but it is, isn't it interesting that so many people do have opinions on this is the whole piece. Then he does another one around in late December that is framed as a discussion between him and the. The concept of civility.

[Craig]

Okay. Oh, boy. Oh.

[Andrew]

Which is him and the concept of civility talking about how people just aren't nice enough to each other anymore. It's like, it's the kind. It's the specific kind of view from nowhere that drives me up a wall because usually what it ends up amounting to is the people who are doing the atrocities and the people who are upset about the atrocities are both equally bad.

[Craig]

I have. I'm so glad you brought this up because it actually connects to. I don't want to jump to it yet, but there's a. There's like a through line, little light motif that he deploys throughout the book that I found really frustrating and couldn't put my finger on why. And so like you, thank you for even just saying, like, view from nowhere take. Because that is exactly what my problem was. Yeah, I'll share that when we get into it. Yeah, it's just like a.

[Andrew]

It's a brand of, like a brand of intellectualism or thought exercises or whatever. That's like, you know, the worst thing you can do is have an opinion.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

Everybody. Everybody. And he especially seems to. To think of himself as a journalist as like his, his role is to not add or subtract anything and take himself totally out of the equation, which is laudable in a way and like the Platonic ideal of what the medium should be, but also is literally impossible. And it's.

[Craig]

Yeah, it's.

[Andrew]

It's just. It's worse in my view not to acknowledge it than it is to. Than it is to like explain what your biases might be or where you might be coming from and how that informs.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

The work that you're doing. I don't know. I don't want to get. I don't want to talk about it for an hour.

[Craig]

But no, I think your point that he has made a career out of. Outside of his sports writing, which he isn't. He's an award winning sports journalist. And like, even the way he gets that Detroit Free Press gig is that he writes some story that gets named like AP story of the Year, and then he gets recommended for this opening at the Detroit Free Press. I think you can still write this. Like, this was the perfect book to be created by somebody who's kind of like, I don't know, I'm writing about sports. Like, I got, I'll do sports takes if you need me to have sports takes, but I'm not quite sure what else to do. And then here is somebody who has like, kind of moral convictions and he's like, oh yeah, moral convictions. I should, I should write a book about that. And he's like, kind of blown away by it. And he, you know, he's gone on

[Andrew]

someone with moral convictions. Only confirms what I have long believe. Nothing generates more opinions,

[Craig]

you know. And like, in some of his writing, he's written about his. He's done charity missionary work in Haiti and like, you should help people who need help. Like, I don't want to dismiss the work there. So I don't know. And I also don't want to, like, I don't come out of this book loving Mitch, but if this is a book that like or anybody listening is attached to, I think that's largely because of Maury Schwartz.

[Andrew]

I think listen that. And that's. And that's the thing about Mitch album is, you know, everybody's got an opinion.

[Craig]

Oh my God.

[Andrew]

I think that's quite something.

[Craig]

I've got an opinion. We need to take a break and when we come back, we'll. It'll be Tuesday with Maury.

[Andrew]

With Maury.

[Craig]

This episode is brought to you by Better Help. Andrew, did you know that March includes International Women's Day?

[Andrew]

I do now.

[Craig]

Did you know that despite having a whole day of celebration, that women are often asked to manage unseen responsibilities and that their emotional well being can easily be overlooked?

[Andrew]

I mean, I did know that I should probably like, think about and appreciate women on days other than International Women's Day.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

Therapy is a space for women to take care of themselves in the way that they deserve. My mom's birthday is in March. Actually. She does a lot. And the last few years of parenting have been really instructive. What I learned from her just by osmosis. Having a kind, thoughtful mom. Therapy can be a great way to think about how you learn about the roles you play in relationships with your family or other loved ones. How to create space, set healthy boundaries and support overall well being for everyone. BetterHelp is here to help by helping you Find quality therapists who are fully licensed in the United States. They're committed to helping you find a great therapist by identifying your needs and preferences and connecting you with someone who is the perfect fit. If you aren't happy, switch to a different therapist at any time. Your emotional well being matters. Find support and feel lighter in therapy. Sign up and get 10% [e-mail] overdue. That's betterhelp.com

[Andrew]

support is available 24. 7 with VRBoCare. We're here day or night, ready whenever you need help. Because a great trip starts with the right support.

[Craig]

Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday. Sometimes when I talk to Simon, he just starts thinking about the day, about whatever day we are living in.

[Andrew]

Is this a show? Are we doing?

[Craig]

This is the show. He'll just start singing the days of the week song that he learned at school, which means. Which sometimes results in him actually not hearing me when I say what day it is. And that's frustrating for both of us because then he gets confused.

[Andrew]

Yeah, I didn't know. Like, we need another. We already got the, like the Friday I'm in love song. We don't need another song about what the days of the week are. Teach them that one. But you can't get the rights.

[Craig]

I don't think they have the rights at school for that one.

[Andrew]

I've seen a lot of daycares and they do not have the rights to a lot of the likenesses that they use in their, like their signage and stuff. So I don't know why they would draw the line here, but maybe I'll

[Craig]

suggest it in the next.

[Andrew]

Tuesdays with Maury.

[Craig]

Yeah, Tuesdays with Maury.

[Andrew]

This book's about these two, these two fellers. One of them's Maury Schwartz, one of them's Mitch Albom.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

How much is which? Who is the am book about?

[Craig]

Good question. This is a book that is voiced by Mitch Albom. He's narrating the. He's narrating the memoir and it is his time with.

[Andrew]

We watch Burn after reading once four months ago and now we both say memoir for it ever.

[Craig]

He is telling us, the reader, about his time with his late professor Maury

[Andrew]

Schwartz and what days did he spend with him Mostly.

[Craig]

Mostly Tuesdays. They are Tuesday people. They say that goes back to their time at Brandeis University where Maury was a professor and where album did his undergrad. He majored in sociology, studied with Maury. He did aspire to be a musician, which Maury always thought was Kind of neat. Maybe you go play the piano for money. That'd be fun. But it's gonna be a hard life.

[Andrew]

He was. And I didn't get a chance to mention this in the. In the opening segment, but. But Mitch Albom was part of that Rock Bottom Remainders band that has Dave Barry in it.

[Craig]

Oh, yeah, Good.

[Andrew]

Great.

[Craig]

And.

[Andrew]

And once you know about the Rock Bottom Remainders, you just. You're. You'll be surprised how often they come up, like, in the last third of Wikipedia articles. It just seems like they're all over the place.

[Craig]

And he. They talk about this also in the novel. In the book. I'm going to keep saying novel, but it's not a novel.

[Andrew]

It's not a novel.

[Craig]

It's a book.

[Andrew]

It's called Tuesdays with Morty.

[Craig]

He wrote his thesis album. Did With Maury as his advisor on football as the new quote. Opium of the masses.

[Andrew]

Mm. What was the old one? Was it opium?

[Craig]

I think so.

[Andrew]

Okay.

[Craig]

I'm also familiar with that phrase as opiate of the masses, but, you know, translation, I suppose. So they. There's like, a little wrapper of this book at the beginning that is like. This is like the last class that me and my favorite professor had together. It's sort of like a class in that I met with him all the time, but there are no grades. There are oral exams every week. Got to talk about what you're talking about. And there's a funeral in lieu of graduation, and I'm the student, and he's my professor. This was our last class together. And so the book progresses through Maury's death and Mitch's reconnection with him. It is interspersed with kind of asynchronous snippets and vignettes of their past and other little scenes as necessary, like, in italics, that are, like, two pages long. Some of them are like. There's, like, maybe two or three little vignettes of MORI teaching that Mitch is giving us, but it's mostly these visits between the two of them at Maury's house, and some of the backstory of Mitch reconnecting with him. Or, like, there's some chapter. There's like, two chapters that are Maury's backstory, like, as a person, just kind of, like biographical information, kind of stuff that are set up, you know, a little bit. It's like. It's a. How to say goodbye and learn what we can before we have to book, you know?

[Andrew]

Yeah, before we have to.

[Craig]

Well, wait.

[Andrew]

Before we have to say goodbye.

[Craig]

Learn what we can before we have to say goodbye. Yeah.

[Andrew]

Okay. I thought you said learn what we can before we have to. And I thought you meant about the learning.

[Craig]

Well, yeah, I could rewrite that sentence. It would be better.

[Andrew]

This is about not waiting till the last minute to do your schoolwork.

[Craig]

Yeah, that's fair. And so I don't really know, kind of like we could go through the book sequentially, but I don't know that that's even the best way to cover it.

[Andrew]

Well, just like, what was your. What was your journey through the book? Because I know, like, based on our Slack messages, that there was a point where you were reading it and you were like, is this like kind of self helpy feel good pablum stuff? Like, am I. Am I accidentally reading the one book from one book theory?

[Craig]

I'm not. It's not one book from one book theory. But it's. There's like, okay. When you're learning about Maury's journey to this moment. So Mitch gives us some background before he reconnects with Maury, that Maury was this, you know, up until the moment he's diagnosed with als. He's this very active guy all the way into his 70s. He loves to dance. He's this kind of free spirit guy who, you know, started teaching at Brandeis in the 60s, I think, or maybe just before the 60s, it becomes this hotbed of, you know, lefty culture and, and the 60s revolution kind of stuff happening. And then now it's 70s into 80s and that's. They're still trying to keep that flame alive. But like, yeah, sure. You know, Maury has a reputation of like, during the Vietnam War, they were just giving out A's left and right so that people didn't get drafted, like that kind of stuff. Maury starts having these progressive degenerative issues and then finally it's diagnosed as ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease. And he knows he only has, you know, a few months to a year left, you know, or so in his life. He's gonna teach one more semester. He's gonna then gonna be done with that. And Mori has this. He goes to a colleague's funeral and he thought it was so sad that the guy had passed away before he could hear any of the nice things that people had to say about him. So he holds a little living funeral in his house that his friends and family can come to, and then he decides to put together a book of like, little aphorisms and things that he's had that he'd been collecting things like, accept what you are able to do and what you are not able to do. Accept the past as past without denying it or discarding it. Learn to forgive yourself and to forgive others. Don't assume that it's too late to get involved and you're like this, sure. Thanks, Mori. Like, yeah, none of it's bad, none of it's unhelpful. None of it is like a stroke of rhetoric or anything like that. That's like particularly unique, I would say. But it does, from watching some of the Nightline footage has an extra power when you're actually like hearing this very exuberant, engaging, charismatic person say this stuff.

[Andrew]

Yeah, right.

[Craig]

It doesn't pop as much when you're just reading it on the page. Because you've seen stuff like this in self help books or in other kind of less engaging media before.

[Andrew]

Well, certain. I mean, definitely, if you're coming at it now instead of coming.

[Craig]

Yeah, sure, yeah.

[Andrew]

Like the, the sort of self help industrial complex in. In 97 was different, established. We've, we've done the Chicken Soup books and all that and all that stuff, but it was not what it is now.

[Craig]

That's a great way to think about it because it is like it's. I think what people may have responded to so strongly with this book is what they might have also liked in, you know, that kind of era of Chicken Soup. Another Oprah feel goody books. Not when she's just promoting other novels or whatever, but it is tied to this very, like, specific Persona from Maury. And he was, he had been on TV on national television. So like you could see him and then go read the book, I guess. But these aphorisms get collected in a. As part of a long profile in the Boston Globe. And that's what leads to the Nightline story. Because somebody sees this Boston Globe article and it's like, hey, Ted Koppel, you gotta go to talk to this guy. Like, okay. And then that those Nightline appearances are what lead us to Mitch seeing him on TV and being like, oh man, I lost touch with Maury. He's dying. I have not been living by the ways that we used to talk when I was his student. And that makes me feel bad and I should go see him.

[Andrew]

Okay.

[Craig]

And so like, yeah, I guess at that point in the book, I'm wondering, like, how am I gonna feel about this? Like, what? I don't, I don't know what I'm gonna take away from it. I'm a little worried. It's Gonna be kind of shallow.

[Andrew]

Well, and also, you know, you, you are reading a book about it. So it's like, you know, to, to what extent is this like being done as a performance so you can tell people about it later like it does. The story that album tells about it is that it, you know, it only became clear it was going to be a book after he decided that he wanted to help Schwartz with his medical expenses.

[Craig]

But like, that is a bone to pick I have with the book, to be honest, that is not mentioned at all. Maybe this is my 2026 politics brain. Maybe I would have felt this way in 95. I found it frustrating that the fact that the book helped the advance for the book helps pay for Maury's medical bills is not mentioned until thus maybe last chapter.

[Andrew]

Okay.

[Craig]

And then it's not expounded upon until the conclusion or not the conclusion. The 25th anniversary afterward that I read.

[Andrew]

Which what, I mean, what, what is different from you in your reading experience if this is mentioned earlier in the book?

[Craig]

I feel like the thing about Maury and his situation is that he has this lovely support system that the whole, Maury's whole point is to kind of dispel the tragedy of death. Okay. And that like to recognize that you can feel sad about it, you can mourn it as it's happening to you, but it's going to happen to you. Make peace with that and then live as fully and as positively as you can with that in mind.

[Andrew]

Sure.

[Craig]

I just, I was a little frustrated at times both from maybe from Mitch's perspective and then also kind of some incongruity in the statements that Mitch includes from Maury that like, I don't know, just my own politics or my own sense of my values that like it. It's not quite too individualistic. I don't think it's that it's, you know, Maury is telling us that like we live in a kind of short sighted, everybody's trying to get theirs culture. And I don't disagree with Maury on that front.

[Andrew]

But, but I think as filtered through album, it seems to be like what can I, the individual learn from?

[Craig]

Yeah, that's actually a good way to put it.

[Andrew]

Yes, I do think that is if you're, if you're looking for threads to, to connect it to like other Oprah books like this that we've read. Not, not like the fiction that she's recommended, but the stuff like this. I think it is that as we talked about in the secret episode, as we've Talked about a bunch of times. Just like the, the shifting of. Of responsibility to the individual to.

[Craig]

So there's. Yes.

[Andrew]

To be the one who reacts to things, to be the one who tries to. Tries to fix things. Whether, whether you're trying to fix the world or just fix your own personal worldview, like, it's all kind of up

[Craig]

to you to do it. And I also kind of, if you

[Andrew]

can't do it, guess who's fault it is.

[Craig]

I. I also think it's a missed opportunity for the people who are, you know, I think, rightfully platforming Maury. I think Maury's cool to say, like, this guy is running up incredible medical debt. Like, what can we do to make sure that his wife isn't destitute, that his sons are not paying down this awful debt to take care of him?

[Andrew]

Like, and then the answer ends up being like, rise and grind. Which is.

[Craig]

Yeah. Which is a bummer also. But, but, but like, inside of the book, it is Maury and Mitch as, like, as, you know, teacher and student. The monikers they have for each other. A coach and player, like, Album always jokes that he called him coach, that, like, they're going to do this one last class together, they're going to do another thesis together, and then Mitch will publish it. But it's clear in the afterword that Mitch is like, yeah, I decided to make this a book because I wanted to help this guy out. And I think that also is, like, a missed opportunity for Mitch to talk about, like, how that might have been weighing on Mori. How that might have been weighing on him as somebody who's going, I don't know, I'm probably reading too much into it. I found it frustrating that it was a throwaway thing at the end of the book as a. Like that it was not a pressure that anybody seemed to be experiencing throughout the rest of the. Of the book. And maybe that's because we're, like, trying to stay laser focused on Maury, and Maury's not thinking about it or Maurice waving it away or doesn't want it in the book. I don't know. So the other. It does, though, like, align with another frustration I have with Mitch in the book. So one of the reasons that Mitch can take all this time to meet with Maury weekly, because they used to meet weekly when he was in school. They're Tuesday people, Maury says, and first he just goes out.

[Andrew]

Does he explain what that means? Explain what that means?

[Craig]

It's when they had, like, their advisory time together. Like, it's like, wet. I don't know if it's when he had office hours.

[Andrew]

I was trying to figure if it's like a. Like a Garfield thing. Like, we will. He hate Mondays. Wednesday's already hump day. Thursday's almost Friday, and Friday's Friday, so that leaves Tuesday.

[Craig]

No, it's. I don't. I don't think it's that. I think it is. It is more a callback to their relationship when they were in school. There is something. What does Mitch say in one of the little vignettes? He's like, he was young as a freshman because he had, like, skipped a grade or something. And Mori was older than all the other professors. They were both kind of like outsiders within their little respective groups. So that's one of the things that attracted them to each other as mentor and mentee. And then as by the end of this book, it's clear that Mitch is a, you know, effectively a third son for Maury. Okay. And the first scene when Mitch, like, goes to visit Mori after seeing him on the news, and it's like, oh, man, I gotta see my. I gotta go see this guy. I feel so bad. He's, like, in his car on a cellular phone. You know, it's a. You know, it's a book from the 90s when they say cellular phone. And he's like a real. Like, he's on the phone. He's drinking coffee on the phone with his editor reviewing a piece. And then he's, like, seeing his dying professor out the window, and he's got to pretend that he's not on the phone. He's like, okay, Mitch, just slow down. Like, he's trying to punch that up.

[Andrew]

He goes.

[Craig]

He has a visit with Mitch, kind of. They reconnect. They make plans to maybe see each other again. Then there's a scene where Mitch is in the UK covering something for Wimbledon, I think. And there's all this, like. And all these people. Like, at this point, Mitch is just reflecting on how much of a 80s guy he's become. Basically, he's like, you know, I have not lived. I've.

[Andrew]

Even though it's the 90s.

[Craig]

Well, but, you know, it's kind of the holdover thing where he's like, you know, I. I started buying. I bought a house on a hill. I bought cars. I invested in stocks and built a portfolio. I was cranked to a fifth gear. Everything I did, I did on a deadline. I exercised like a demon. I drove my car at breakneck speed. I made more money than I had ever figured to see. Okay. Brag much, Mitch. Okay.

[Andrew]

Yeah. You're Robin Williams and Hook. Like, we get it.

[Craig]

It's big Robin Williams. It is big Robin Williams and Hook. Energy

[Andrew]

at the beginning of Hook.

[Craig]

Yeah, at the beginning. Not. Not when he.

[Andrew]

Not at the end, after he, like, rediscovers his sense of childlike wonder.

[Craig]

No. And so when he does and can see the food, when he visits with Mori, Mori kind of holds him to account, where he's like, hey, are you giving to your community? Are you at peace with yourself? Are you trying to be as human as you can be? And in his head, Mitch is like, and I quote, I was 37, more efficient than in college, tied to computers and modems and cell phones. Like, okay, Mitch, you're just a robot, man.

[Andrew]

I'm so efficient.

[Craig]

But he is in the uk, remarking on people buying tabloids about. About the Royals. The O.J. simpson trial is in full swing.

[Andrew]

Oh, boy. Yeah.

[Craig]

And people give up days and weeks of their lives addicted to someone else's drama. Like, Mitch. That's not what. That's part of the OJ Trial. But that's not all of the OJ trial. And the OJ trial is a running theme of this book, which makes sense. It was written in 99, you know, about 95. I. He comes back from the UK, he does this thing throughout the book where he sees a newspaper and is like, oh my God, the horrors.

[Andrew]

Okay.

[Craig]

I leaf through the Boston newspaper that sat near Maury's chair. There was a story about a small timber town where two teenage girls tortured and killed a 73 year old man who had befriended them, then threw a party in his trailer home and showed off the corpse. There was another story about the upcoming trial of a straight man who killed a gay man after the latter had gone on a TV talk show and said he had a crush on him. He does like stuff like that, but he does. He does it in the View from Nowhere voice, Andrew. Because he just like drops a paragraph like that and then just hangs out with Maury some more. He. He never closes the loop on this.

[Andrew]

Listen, I'm gonna tell you this thing, but I don't have an opinion on it.

[Craig]

The opinion is that it's.

[Andrew]

And I'm gonna. I'm gonna let you kind of pick up through implication what it is that I'm getting at. Like, just the. The world is. We live in a fallen world. And what if we listen to Maury's wisdom instead? And seems to be the point that that is being Made.

[Craig]

But yeah, I guess. And, and, and Even with the O.J. thing, like, at the end, he's like. And there were, you know, black people cheering in the streets at the verdict, and there were white people stunned in silence. And I just, just didn't know what it all meant. And you're like, okay.

[Andrew]

And then I stopped thinking about it.

[Craig]

And then I stopped thinking about it. And I had to publish the book, I guess, like, okay.

[Andrew]

I didn't know what all, what it all meant. And I was fine living in that uncertainty.

[Craig]

So he.

[Andrew]

I didn't feel, I didn't feel a need to follow up on any of this.

[Craig]

He comes back from the uk. I've talked about stuff throughout the book at this point. He comes back from the UK and he wakes up the next morning and he gets a phone call and is like, oh, the newspaper's on strike. You don't have to go to work anymore. And he's like, oh, suddenly I found myself at odds with my employer and no one was going to read my words. I don't know what to do. So he calls him worry.

[Andrew]

You didn't have any opinion on the labor issues at hand, huh?

[Craig]

His opinion on the labor issues was that he was stunned how quickly the world seemed to be moving on without his column.

[Andrew]

Sure.

[Craig]

And that he didn't know what he was going to do with his time and that he seemed a little shocked by how out of hand some of the protests were getting.

[Andrew]

Okay.

[Craig]

I found that pretty irksome.

[Andrew]

I can, I can tell that you're just like Mitch Alpham. Seems like a kind guy who is, who is fundamentally well intentioned, I think, in most ways.

[Craig]

Yeah, sure. Yes.

[Andrew]

But also he has, I don't know, like, specific things that he just doesn't pay attention to or think about that are born of the, of whatever privilege it is that he has and he's not interested in interrogating that at all.

[Craig]

Yeah. So the reason he could spend all this time with Maury and listen to Maury stories and Maury's point of view is because he doesn't have to go to work because there's a strike on and he's not on the picket line, so he's.

[Andrew]

Why not, Mitch?

[Craig]

Great question. I don't know.

[Andrew]

Why'd you make that choice, Mitch?

[Craig]

I don't know. Or if he is, he doesn't mention it at all. Just like, yeah, anyway, so, I mean,

[Andrew]

imagine Mitch being on the picket line with a handwritten cardboard sign that says, everyone's making good points.

[Craig]

I can't I gotta, I gotta talk about Mori. I'm so sorry, Maury. I feel so bad for Maury. I'm not talking about him at all. We're spending every Tuesday with him. They go, I'm gonna try to run through kind of quickly what the, what the beats.

[Andrew]

They, yeah, please do. Because I don't, I don't want to talk, I don't want to talk about. I don't want to talk about this for an hour and a half, to be totally honest with you.

[Craig]

It's, it's, it's an interesting book because, like, yeah, if you don't want to think about death, this isn't the book to read. Like, if you don't, this is the book where you are, like, hopefully gonna get charmed into thinking about death a little bit by Maury.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

And you're gonna come away. I think a lot of folks might get some of what this book can give you from. If you are a person of faith, your pastor, your rabbi, maybe you get it from your therapist, maybe get it from a trusted friend. There are good reminders in here to live a life that is not self centered, to live a life that, you know, has a finite end of your experience. And so what are you going to do with that time? Mitch describes Maury as kind of a religious omnivore, you know, raised, you know, he's a Russian Jew and his parents were Russian immigrants anyway, but he dabbled in Buddhism and kind of just took whatever felt good for him. Very 60s of him, I suppose.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

And at one point, you know, Mori is just like, hey, you got to live your life. There's like a thing from the Buddhists say you just got to live your life with a little bird on your shoulder that every day asks, is today the day? Is this going to be it? And you just got to think about what you would do if that were the case. And not in a, like, oh, God, I got to go, like, turn the toaster off. But in a, like, I got a

[Andrew]

little bird on my shoulder. Who asked that? But it's not about me.

[Craig]

That's fair. What does Maury say? 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. And then once they decide that they are going to write a book, and they're gonna kind of treat this like a little seminar. Then Mitch comes.

[Andrew]

Does he talk at all about the process of bringing Maury around on making it into a book, or does it just kind of happen?

[Craig]

They. He says they kind of agree on it together. Like, basically, they meet two or three times, and then it's. The strike is on, and it's clear that Mitch is coming every Tuesday. And Mitch comes back with, like, specific topics for them to talk about. Like, he basically said, like, what about, like, Maury was like, go off and write about a bunch of your, like, fears or big questions you have if you were dying, and then let's talk about them. So, like, Mitch makes a list, and then they come back, and they kind of hammer out each one as they go. And so there is, like, Maury has this thing where they're talking about regrets. He says the culture doesn't encourage you to think about, you know, such things, big things, until you're about to die. We're so wrapped up with egotistical things. Career, family, having enough money, meeting the mortgage, getting a new car, fixing the radiator when it breaks. We're involved in trillions of little acts just to keep going so we don't get into the habit of standing back and looking at our lives and saying, is this all? Is this all I want? Is something missing? There's, like. There is an interesting tension I find in some of the stuff that Maury says where he's like, you gotta have big dreams. You gotta, you know, kind of, like, dream big about the love you want to see in the world.

[Andrew]

Sure.

[Craig]

And, you know, your career ambition is gonna blind you to that and, you know, lead you to not be happy. But in his list of things that we're so wrapped up in, he's, like, fixing the radiator when it breaks. Like, my radiator is broken, Maury. I gotta fix it so my house

[Andrew]

is comfortable, so my house has heat.

[Craig]

That's not me, like, trying to get a better radiator than the Joneses.

[Andrew]

I'm trying. I'm trying to make my house hot.

[Craig]

There's, like, every once in a while, I have to, like, try to square Maury's, like, live your best life energy with his down to earth energy. And there's always, like, a little fun incongruity there. But he became a teacher because he couldn't go into kind of manual labor. He didn't want to make money exploiting other people. And he doesn't like lawyers, and he can't Stand blood. So he can't be a doctor, so he becomes a teacher.

[Andrew]

He does work through process of elimination.

[Craig]

Yeah, he does work on folks with mental illness and largely comes to the conclusion that. And this is, you know, mid 20th century, folks who'd been committed to institutions really just needed to be treated like they were still human. And that would largely help them with a lot of what they were struggling with. And then he starts teaching at Brandeis, and that connects him to Mitch. That's like. There's some. There's some more tragic backstory stuff we get about his family and how, like, when his mother died, he was the only person in his family who could read English, to, like, read the telegram, and he's only 8 years old. Like, pretty rough stuff. But no, they talk about death. They talk about how you. Once you learn to die, you learn how to live. That's Maury's whole thing. That's why he went on Nightline. He's like, I know what my body is doing. Like, the way that they talk about ALS is the nerves in your body to start truly shutting down. And so you're gonna lose your legs, you're gonna lose the use of your arms, you're going to lose coordination and speech issues. Your mind is going to be generally fine. And then the thing that's going to actually take you out is that you're going to have trouble breathing. And so he is just like, all right, well, I'm going to figure out how I want to die. I'm going to make sure it works for everybody in my life, and I'm going to spend the time that I have reconnecting with everybody as much as I can.

[Andrew]

Sure.

[Craig]

They talk about family, the importance of family, of the like. If there's an arc for Mitch in this book that isn't just about his relationship with Maury, it's about his brother, who's estranged, who got cancer and then went to Europe, got some treatment, is in remission, and Mitch, but, like, doesn't want to talk to his family about it. So Mitch, is he in a. In an odd moment, or let's say a not an uncommon moment of introspection from Mitt. He kind of registers that one of the things calling him to be with Mori might be the fact that he. His brother, is not letting him do that for him. So, like, there's like, a. And the book ends with him reaching out to his brother and them reconnecting. Mori gives us some advice on emotions about having them, but don't wallow in Them, you know, you can learn to experience them and then detach. He does practice, like, Buddhist meditation, which seems like where that's coming from. He says he gives himself a little bit of time in the morning each day to kind of mourn his. His state. And then he has to move on or else he can't, you know, progress with the day.

[Andrew]

Yeah, sure.

[Craig]

He says some interesting stuff about aging, Andrew, where, like, you know, a lot. Mitch keeps asking him, like, do you love to dance? Like, you love to be so active? Like, how can you not envy the young? And he's like, I don't know, man. Like, I've been there. He's like, I. We're all gonna. We're all gonna grow into who we're gonna grow into. Like, it. It madness lies. Like, just looking backward. Like, he just.

[Andrew]

Yeah, right. Like, I definitely. You know, we are. We are 30 or 40 years old, each of us, at this point in our lives, and there are definitely things where it's like. Yeah. I mean, like, in sort of an abstract way, I miss, like, going out or whatever, but in a more concrete way. That's very loud, and I'm very tired.

[Craig]

Yeah. Yes, exactly.

[Andrew]

And it's like, you know, I look at it, and it's not that. It's not that I don't have a twinge of something, you know, there. You know, you do have nostalgia for a bygone era. Maybe you have a couple of things you would have done differently or things you wish you'd appreciated more. But. But I don't sit around thinking, man, I do miss being 27.

[Craig]

Yes. Yes. That's exactly how Mori approaches it. And he also says, like, I am all of. I have been all of those ages. All of those ages are me. So in any moment where I feel myself just being a little envious of somebody younger than me, I can just think about what it was like when I was there and try to find something enjoyable for myself from that age. He also, like, makes an argument for Lear, like, learning to love being dependent and, like, learning to let people care for you and finding ways to, like, that even.

[Andrew]

Sure.

[Craig]

When it's very vulnerable. And it's like people literally helping you move your body around your own house. And that's the thing.

[Andrew]

That's the thing about babies.

[Craig]

That's what he kind of says.

[Andrew]

Yeah. The most unfair thing about babies is they don't know how good they got it. They just cry all the time. It's like, you. You will never again in your life, except maybe at the very End of it, if you're lucky.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

Have your needs tended to to this degree? Could you chill out a little bit?

[Craig]

He talks about money. It's bad. Materialism is bad. People embrace material things when what they really need is tenderness or com or camaraderie. He also gets a little into like a share your talents with the world mode, like giving is better than receiving kind of stuff. You know. He talks about if, you know, he's like, what does he say? He's like, if you know how to do computers, like, go to an old folks home. Like, they don't know how to do computers. They'll love you. Like, it's, it's some good old volunteerism is good for the soul kind of stuff. He talks about love. It's important. There's not much in that chapter other than his father apparently died, as he says it, suddenly from a heart attack after being mugged and just like running away from the mugging. And he doesn't want his. He doesn't want his family to have to find him dead. He wants them to know what's going to happen and when. And he wants to do everything he can to make that possible.

[Andrew]

Good luck.

[Craig]

Yep. They talk about marriage.

[Andrew]

One of the, One of the lessons you already talked about was a little bird who tells you that you're mortal.

[Craig]

Yup. They talk about forgiveness. They talk about the perfect day. There's a whole chapter with the culture. Maury talks about the culture that we have today. And largely he means the things that are preventing us from being human and being present and caring for one another.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Craig]

He says people are only mean when they are threatened. And that's what our culture does. That's what our economy does. Even people who have jobs in our economy are threatened because they worry about losing them. And when you get threatened, you start looking out only for yourself. You start making money a God. It is all part of this culture, which is why I don't buy into it. Like, preach, Maury.

[Andrew]

Yeah, no, that's good. No, that's good. That's good. Of Maury.

[Craig]

This is like Mitch, did.

[Andrew]

Did Mitch have anything seem to be like, about that?

[Craig]

Mitch seemed to be like, yeah, this makes sense to me. But. And then they watched the end of the O.J. trial, like, okay.

[Andrew]

I mean, it's hard to keep being introspective when the trial, when the verdict's coming down.

[Craig]

You know, the, the interest, like the I don't buy into it stuff with Maury has kind of like. He does elaborate on that because you can't truly opt out of it. Right, right. And then he does elaborate and just kind of say, like, build a community of people you love and who love you. You can build a little corner of the world that is better than the world at large. If this is what the world at large is offering you kind of thing.

[Andrew]

Yeah, I mean, I do feel that every day. Every minute of every day.

[Craig]

And then they, you know, they. They talk about Maury's perfect day, which is very simple. And then there's the chapter where Maury finally passes, where, of course, Mitch reads another terrifying newspaper. Okay. My note just says he never really elaborates on this. I'm not even sure what I want him to say. Say, I don't know. Maury finally makes Mitch cry. He's not a crier. Mitch finally reaches out to his brother. He and his brother exchange faxes, which is very silly. There's also a struck me funny, tell

[Andrew]

someone you love them, send them a fact.

[Craig]

There's a struck me funny, Andrew. That's very 90s. I hadn't even considered where Mitch talks

[Andrew]

about how he's, like, talking to Maury was, like, trying to keep my Tamagotchi.

[Craig]

No, no. He's gonna. He's gonna not. He's. He's gonna stop renting a cell phone when he rents his car at the airport so that the newspaper can't find him, which the newspapers on strike. Anyway, Mitch, it doesn't matter. I hadn't even considered that. You would, like, rent a cell phone. Yeah.

[Andrew]

You would rent a cell. They would. Yeah, they would. They would be one of the add ons that they try to give you.

[Craig]

It's kind of nuts. I thought it was kind of funny.

[Andrew]

Like now when they, like now when they're like, hey, would you like to pay a bunch of money for car insurance? That's redundant if you already have car insurance.

[Craig]

But it'.

[Andrew]

Yeah, that's my cool. That's my cool tip for everybody is like, usually if you have a car that's insured, you already have insurance for your rental car and you don't need to pay extra money.

[Craig]

Yeah, probably not.

[Andrew]

Don't do it.

[Craig]

Don't do it. Yeah.

[Andrew]

Tuesdays with Andrew.

[Craig]

My reaction to this book is that Maury seems pretty cool. And I got more out of watching 10 minutes of Maury on Nightline. Like, more is going to stick with me from actually watching the Nightline footage, which is out there on the Internet.

[Andrew]

You understand why somebody felt compelled to write a book about this? Man. Yeah, then. But you do have Issues with maybe the imperfect vessel that Maury chose to.

[Craig]

Yeah, I thought Maury deserved a better partner. I could see why this would be a very effective film or play. It was turned into a play. Jeffrey Hatcher, because you.

[Andrew]

Wait, what was you saying names? Like, what was.

[Craig]

That's the play. That's the playwright who worked on it. Sorry.

[Andrew]

Okay.

[Craig]

Okay, cool. Yeah. Kobe. What do I just like saying names? Sports, guys.

[Andrew]

Yeah. I don't know. Will Ferrell. I don't know. We're just saying guys.

[Craig]

Sorry, but what the. In the afterword, they kind of lay out. There's like, this whole story of the book's publication. And this can take us out because it's kind of the thesis of the book that Mitch was looking for a publisher so that he could get this book published to help pay Maury's medical bills. Very noble. Again, I think Maury being in some sort of medic, like financial distress, might have helped color the book a little bit. But he says here, my publisher or my agent encouraged me to just write a letter about why I wanted to write the book rather than write a formal proposal because I had never really written a book before. And in there is this paragraph. We hope the readers find a piece of themselves in us. Every son who had a father, every student who had a teacher, every kid who had a coach, a mentor, a source of wisdom. And once they find themselves, maybe they will go the last mile to the end. Morrie's death. Because the payoff of the whole thing is the best last lesson one generation can teach the next how to die with peace about how you've lived. I do think that is there in the book for you to find it. If you can not be distracted by Mitch Albom, as I was. I totally understand why folks would, like how Maury might kind of be a stand in for other people in your life or folks that you wish were in your life. And you would then kind of connect the lessons to that. So that's Tuesdays with Maury. Thanks, Oprah, for making it a book we've all heard about before.

[Andrew]

Thank you, Oprah.

[Craig]

We don't thank you enough, Oprah.

[Andrew]

Thank you, Oprah, for, like, making. For keeping books relevant as a medium for decades and decades.

[Craig]

I don't. I don't thank you for the members of the current presidential administration that you platformed, but here we are. The secret. Oh, well, it's.

[Andrew]

I'm just thinking these things happen.

[Craig]

These things happen. So thanks for letting me talk to you on this Tuesday, Andrew, or whatever day it is.

[Andrew]

It's Monday. Money is Thursday. We're recording on Thursday. It's going to post on Monday. But maybe you're listening to it.

[Craig]

If you're listening to this on a Tuesday, tell us. If you're listening to this on a Tuesday, send us an email. Overdupod gmail.com send us a message on social media at overdue pod. Listen to our theme song by Nick Laurengis. Tell us that you did it on Tuesday with Overdue. Tuesdays with Overdue.

[Andrew]

Who do you think Craig might be the father of?

[Craig]

I just.

[Andrew]

I just want to know. Tell us.

[Craig]

I already talked about him. He's my son. But not Mitch Albom?

[Andrew]

No, not Mitch album.

[Craig]

Not Maury Schwartz?

[Andrew]

No. Well, I mean, we didn't run the tests.

[Craig]

We didn't run the test. The envelope is still in the back, Andrew. If folks want to know more about the show, where do they go?

[Andrew]

Overdue podcast.com's the Internet website. We have the schedule for the month of March. We have the books that we have read in the past. We've got all the links that Craig talked about and also a link to our patreon page. That's patreon.com overduepod if you support us financially, you can get an ad free version of the show. Feedback. You can get bonus episodes when they come out. You can get our newsletter, Dusty Bookshelves. You can get access to our Discord community, all kinds of other stuff.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Andrew]

Patreon.com overdupod it makes the show possible in an extremely literal sense.

[Craig]

Yep.

[Andrew]

And we appreciate all of you who have. Who are donating now or who have ever donated or who are thinking about donating.

[Craig]

We appreciate it.

[Andrew]

Cover the full spectrum of all possible times, past, present and future. Next week I am reading 13 Ways to Kill Lulibelle Rock by Maude Wolf. Wolf. I wonder what the ways, what some of the ways are going to be?

[Craig]

Does it happen on a Tuesday?

[Andrew]

I can't. I can't wait to find out.

[Craig]

Are there only 13 ways or just here are 13 ways?

[Andrew]

I think it's like five people you meet in heaven where, like, there are more than five people, but. But, like, we're only going to talk about five of them.

[Craig]

Okay, cool. Well, I can't wait to find out if any of those ways work.

[Andrew]

Okay. All right, everybody, thank you for listening to our podcast until we talk to you next week. I got an envelope, Another envelope. Oh, no. I'm going to open it up. It says try to be happy on it. Bye, Sam. That was a headgum podcast.