I have decided to get through my Mitch Albom collection.
Over the last two years, I think I have purchased every one of his books, but I have yet to read them. They’ve been sitting on my shelf, waiting. Books I meant to get to when life slowed down.
If you are interested in hearing my thoughts on The Little Liar and Twice, I wrote about them in previous posts. Those were my first real introductions to his work, and they stayed with me. Enough that I kept buying more, even if I didn’t open them right away.
Mitch Albom has been around for a long time. My mother used to read him when I was in my twenties. That is over twenty years of bestsellers.
I am a skeptical person. I am not too quick to jump on the bandwagon. I have to see for myself. Or in this case, read for myself.
And I have.
Albom’s writing is not sensational or predictable. It doesn’t feel like it is trying to keep up with pop culture or trends. It feels like literature that endures. The kind that reaches for something deeper and actually finds it. The kind that grips you and says, pay attention…this might change you if you let it.
So, I’m reading Tuesdays with Morrie.
I’m not that far in, but it already feels like I’ve gone a distance. I can sense what’s ahead. Not in a way where I know what will happen, but in a way that tells me this story is going to ask something of me.
I am almost giddy in anticipation of the golden nuggets Morrie is likely to bring.
At the same time, I feel cautious.
This is not fiction. Someone actually lived this. That adds a level of solemnity that I can’t ignore. It makes me pay attention differently.
Even now, I find myself drifting off at times. Not because the writing isn’t good, but because it pulls me into my own memories. My childhood. My early adulthood. Versions of myself I haven’t thought about in a long time.
I have lived many lives, and I have been blessed tremendously.
But there is one place that still carries a quiet kind of disappointment.
I wanted to be a journalist.
When I look back at that younger version of myself, she was full of hope. Full of possibility. But she had no real understanding of the path. She didn’t know what led where. She was making choices, moving forward, trying…but without direction.
I was guessing my way through life.
And somewhere along the way, that dream stopped being an option.
There wasn’t a moment where I said goodbye to it. No clear decision. It just fell away, and life filled in the space with other responsibilities, other roles, other priorities.
Reading about Mitch Albom’s drive, I couldn’t help but notice the difference.
He was building something.
I was working just as hard, but it felt like I was digging a hole, thinking I was building a house.
People often say that success comes from support. Scaffolding. That people like him had the right encouragement, the right resources, the right voices around them.
Maybe that’s true.
But I don’t think that’s the whole story.
I think it has something to do with understanding the steps.
Knowing what comes first. Then what comes next. And what it actually takes to move from one place to another.
I didn’t know that.
I didn’t know that becoming a journalist meant going to college, choosing the right courses, finding internships, building experience, making connections. I didn’t understand the financial side of it either. What it would cost. What it would require to sustain that kind of path.
I had the dream.
But I didn’t know how to turn it into a goal.
And there is a difference.
Saying I wanted to be a journalist meant something in my heart. But in real life, it didn’t mean much without direction. Without steps. Without any real understanding of how to get there.
So I moved forward, working hard, but without a clear path.
Journalism may not be my path anymore. That feels settled.
But writing isn’t gone.
It shows up in my life over and over again. In the mornings. In my blog. In the thoughts that won’t leave me alone until I sit down and write them out.
And I think about something I read in Bird by Bird. Anne Lamott gives a simple definition of a writer.
Writers write.
That’s it.
No credentials. No perfect timing. No guarantee of where it will lead.
Just the act itself.
And I do that.
Not perfectly. Not consistently. But enough to know that it’s there.
So maybe I didn’t miss it in the way I thought I did.
Maybe I just didn’t recognize it.
I didn’t become a journalist.
But I am writing.
And maybe that counts for more than I’ve been willing to admit.
I’m still at the beginning of Tuesdays with Morrie.
But already, it has me paying attention.
Not just to the story.
But to my own.
If this post spoke to you…
Share it with someone who might need it, too. Whether it’s a quiet encouragement or a new way of seeing things, these reflections are meant to be passed along.
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Martina Griffin is a Catholic convert, writer, wife, and mother of four. She writes about faith, motherhood, beauty, books, and the quiet ache of transformation. A lover of popcorn, deep questions, and old classics, she shares her heart at Big Bowl of Popcorn—one post at a time. Instagram | Facebook | Email Me |
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A novel about love, grief, and what is remembered and misunderstood.
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