“Becoming” by Michelle Obama

As 2018 draws to a close, “Becoming” by Michelle Obama tops the New York Times’ non-fiction best-seller list. Deep within the memoir lies a 1990 story of personal loss that was as much a turning point in her life as meeting her future husband, Barack Obama, one year earlier.

Before looking back on her years as First Lady during her husband’s two-term presidency, Michelle Obama (née Robinson) opens up about her humble beginnings growing up on Chicago’s South Side: graduating from Chicago’s first magnet high school, getting accepted at Princeton and then Harvard Law School, and pursuing careers in law and public service. Just about halfway through her journey — when she was 26 — she experienced the loss of her close friend and college roommate Suzanne Alele, who died of lymphoma.

Michelle describes Suzanne as a light-hearted, Nigerian-born student who grew up in Jamaica. Unlike Michelle, who was a self-described “control freak,” Suzanne loved parties and was always in pursuit of things that made her happy.

The former First Lady uses both her characteristic humor and penchant for deep reflection when recalling her close friend. On the lighter side, she writes about how Suzanne used to clutter their dorm room with strewn clothes. “Years later, I’d fall in love with a guy who, like Suzanne, stored his belongings in heaps and felt no compunction, really ever, to fold his clothes. But I was able to coexist with it, thanks to Suzanne,” says Michelle, adding, “I am still coexisting with that guy to this day.”

But Suzanne’s death left her with more than wistful reminiscences. The loss came at a time when Michelle’s father’s health, which had long endured the steady ravages of multiple sclerosis, worsened. Fraser C. Robinson III died the next year. Bereaved by the losses of her friend and father, Michelle began to question how much her work with a Chicago law firm impacted  the world. The sense that “life was short and not to be wasted,” as she later writes, became shockingly obvious. Law as a profession suddenly wasn’t enough.

Shortly before facing this dilemma, she had met Barack Obama, a man whose career after law school had not followed the prescribed path that Michelle’s had. What struck her was how assured he seemed of his own direction in life, which she describes as “an improvisational zigzag through disparate worlds.”

Before long there were two issues that needed to be faced. Michelle writes, “The first thing was that I hated being a lawyer. I wasn’t suited to the work. I felt empty doing it…second was that I was deeply, delightfully in love with a guy whose forceful intellect and ambition could possibly end up swallowing mine. I saw it coming already, like a barreling wave with a mighty undertow. I wasn’t going to get out of its path — I was too committed to Barack by then, too in love — but I did need to quickly anchor myself on two feet.”

Michelle Obama talks about her memoir “Becoming” in Dallas
Credit: Michelle Obama Facebook page

After more soul searching, Michelle took a great decrease in salary when she left corporate law to take a job at Chicago city hall as an assistant to the mayor, her first step in a new career devoted to public service and community organizing. She also, with deliberate effort, managed to maintain her individual integrity while uniting with the powerful personality of the future 44th President of the United States.

Upon putting the memoir down, one wonders how different her future — and our country’s future — might have been without the formidable losses of her dear friend and father in 1990 and 1991.