For One More DayWritten by: Mitch Albom

(There’s another Independent Study Unit…)

By: Naomi AguileraClass: Mr.Coghlan

Date: 12/9/2011

If you had just ONE day…

To get the chance to go back for one day to fix everything you did wrong

in your life…

• If you did what would you do?• Would you take back hurting a passed loved one?• Would let someone know how much you really

appreciated and loved them for all their efforts?• Finally would you be able to handle discovering

the real reasons on why situations in your life turned the way they did?

. Would you take

it?

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Mitch Albom’s #1 New York Times Bestseller novel For One More Day is story that gives his readers a philosophical view on life. Similar to one of his previous novels(many of us have read Tuesdays with Morrie) it is a novel that makes us think of the choices we have made in our life and how they affect others and how everything happens for a reason in our lives. The novel goes in an in depth look of what would actually happen if we received “one more day” to meet our past problems and ghosts. Overall it is a story of redemption by going back in time and fixing past mistakes and showing appreciation for our loved ones.

Exploring:For One More Day

Meet Chick Benetto whose life spirals into a complete mess

after the death of his mother, Posey. He deals with problems with his career, finances and becomes an alcoholic who then leaves his family and ends up in a depression where he then tries to commit suicide. At a young age Chick is placed in a position by his father, Len where he must choose which parent to love, he makes his choice by Len telling him this: “You can either be a momma’s boy or a daddy’s boy but you can’t be both.” So he chooses to completely idolize and worship his father. Consistently he goes against his loving mother who gives him all her love and tries to give him the best she can, and instead brushes that away to tries to please his cold hearted father.

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Details on For One More Day

At any moment he possibly could Chick would always take the side of Len

over Posey. When asked about Posey’s cooking Chick would agree with Len and would say it tasted bad, any type of behaviour Len portrayed Chick would mimic it. If Chick wanted to laugh but Len wasn’t laughing Chick did not laugh , if Len did not like what Chick was wearing due to Posey’s choices Chick certainly did not like it. He then makes a list in the book called times my mother stood up for me and times I did not stand up for my mother. (Obviously his Mother outweighs him).Chick also made it his passion to play baseball because Len strongly loved baseball. He then made it a priority to become a professional baseball player in order to satisfy Len’s dreams and throw away his college education even after Posey balances two jobs just to send him to college. He then regrets the day where he leaves his mom’s 70th birthday to go to a baseball game after his father insistence, during that game Posey dies right in front of his daughter. After that event he tries to kill himself but fails and goes into a dream where he meets with his mother and gets one more chance to find out details on his parents divorce and gets to see how his mother had an unconditional love for him.

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Furthermore…

Albom makes it a crucial to make his readers understand his main

themes in the book and tries to tackle these themes by using unique situations. Such as making one of his main characters Posey a single independent mother during the 1950’s in a small town, where a situations like that would be unheard of.

Mortality is one of the biggest themes used throughout the book. It gives readers the chance to wonder about the possibilities of reconnecting what you could do if you had the chance to meet again with a dead relative. After Chick’s suicide attempt he is put into a dream where he meets Posey again. There Posey takes him back in time to revisit the past mainly events in his childhood. To show him how she tried to protect and love him. It is here where Chick realizes all the mistakes he did unto his mother. It questions readers if you were given the chance to go back would you apologize for all the things you did and how would you want to spend a day with a lost loved one. It also makes us wonder whether or not we can handle moving on with our life if we got to fix our mistakes and would we continue to be the same person—Chick certainly did not remain the same person. Through this book I got analyze Chick’s realizations on his past mistakes and it allowed me to compare how I would take back any of my mistakes and seeing how Chick tried to fix his past decisions it let me really understand if you can fix past decisions or not.

. Themes in For One More Day

A theme that I recognized immediately after finishing novel that is not aas highly focused on is

unconditional love—and a smaller theme attached to that would be taking a loved one for granted. After continuously being shut down and getting rejected by her son’s love Posey does not give up on her son. The unconditional love Posey has for her son is very evident. She does her absolute best to ignore the rejection and blame Chick gives her and continues to provide what is best for her son which is: love, care, and support and completely on her own. She never tries to walk out or give up on Chick and always tries to teach him valuable lessons. However Chick never sees that growing up and constantly tries to push Posey away from his and wishes she didn’t love him as much. Not until later he realizes how wrong most of his actions were.

I’m sure many of us can relate that in the past we take our parents for granted. We do not always see the their logic or even know the real reason as on why they do certain things. Similar to Chick I have taken my mom for granted and have tried to push her away by my actions and words. Yet after reading this book you see that a mother’s love for their child is really strong and that love is unconditional because what I learned from this book is that no matter how much you try to reject a parents love when they truly love you they always stick around for you and do the best to understand you. Unfortunately most us don’t see that when we’re young, and some us like Chick figure that out too late. We think after time and time after hurting our parents they are used to it , so they will always be there, by doing this Chick put himself in a state of mind where is Posey would always be there it wasn’t until she was finally dead . Many of us don’t realize how some of our actions can hurt our parents but subconsciously we know they will always forgive us, this plays into mothers—or parents attaining a n unconditional because if they still are by your side after either disappointing them or trying to go against them by pleasing someone else (similar to Chick), no matter what you do though if a parent really loves you they never walk out.

. Other Themes in For One More Day

A huge and obvious theme in For One More Day is divorce. This is

how I related to the book the most because like Chick my parents also divorced when I was young. After seeing continuously through the book that Chick would show more love for Len then Posey, it reminded me of my younger self. My parents did not get along at all and at a young age sub-consciously I felt torn between which one to show more love more. Like Chick I chose my dad, anything my mom would try to do I wouldn’t think was a good enough and when my mom was always more stricter then my dad, I was blind to seeing that it was for the best of me. As a child though I did not see my dad as often and like Chick said in the book :``Kids chase for the love that eludes them and for me that was my father`s love..`` so I would chase for my dad`s love because he wasn`t always there. I felt obligated when I was young to show more appreciation towards him but in the process I was putting my down. Again similar to Chick it wasn`t until I was older that I came to a clear realization why it did not work out between my parents and I discovered the truth on certain past situations, after realizing this I stopped picking between which parent to love more; un fortunately unlike me Chick did not realize this until his Mom was dead.

Divorce

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tZlCZyGBIk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPKsihGrVT4&feature=youtu.be

In the first clip it is an example of a theme we have studied before “appearance.vs.reality”. Similar in Macbeth, Macbeth tried to make it appear that he didn’t kill the King when he indeed did. To Chick growing up his father was an idol to him and to him it was his mom who was the “bad guy”. Growing up he thought Posey was constantly trying to willingly push out Len out of his life. However the REALIITY of the situation is that Posey did not want Len to be around her kids to be around a father that was deceiving and unfaithful.

In the second clip I’ll be comparing it to the film Riding in Cars with Boys which is about a woman who gets impregnated at age 16 by a man she barely knows and if forced to marry him for the sake of their child. The man is a heroin addict and is irresponsible and does not want her son to be raised by such a negative influence so she tells him to leave her and Jason’s life forever. This also is an example of appearance.vs.reality because Jason thought his mom was ruining his life yet in reality she was being a great mother by protecting him from any dangers.

. For One More Day Movie Clip

Family Bonding

At one point in the book Chick reconnects with Len after Len comes to see

him play professional baseball. There they are back in communication and Len is constantly there for Chick, yet it is evident he is not there because he loves Chick he is there because Chick is living the dream Len wish he had. As Chick`s health is declining and as he ages he finally tells his father there is no point of him playing baseball. However Len will not hear this and tries to completely force Chick to not quit baseball. Even though it is impossible for Chick to play as successfully as he did when he was young. These unrealistic views reminded me of the Great Gatsby because Len like Gatsby feel he can control things you can not control and both characters are blind to seeing some situations in life are beyond human control. After all how is it possible for Chick to not to age and slowly his baseball talent starts to diminish with age. Len and Gatsby both try to re create the past. Len wants Chick to play baseball and be as good as he was in the past however that`s impossible because all athletes have their time were their successful and slowly that fades away, but Len doesn’t think that is possible and keeps forcing things that are not meant to be forced.

. For One More Day

Comparisons

The message I picked up from the book may slightly differentiate from most people however overall the book taught me to forgive the ones we love. To understand that there is no such thing as a perfect family. It taught me that relatives will disappoint us and some of the actions we do onto our relatives may not be intentionally but either way we should always forgive them. But it also sent me the message that we do not always get a second chance and the we should appreciate the actual day we have with our relatives and make today count, instead of waiting for another day to come to redeem ourselves. All of us won`t be as lucky as Chick to get a second chance, so enjoy the day you have with your family and show the appreciation and you have for your family before it’s too late.

. And finally…

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. .

``Have you ever lost someone you loved and wanted one

more conversation, one more chance to make up for the time and you thought they

would be here forever? If so, then you know you can go your whole life collecting

days, and none will outweigh the one you wish you had

back.”-Chick Benetto, For One More

Day