Achieving Serenity

New Life Plus

Learning how to live again

There were a lot of things I wish I could go back and tell my younger self. I lashed out a lot as a teenager, most likely from suppressed anger. My dad up and left the family when I was only two years old and I didn't see him again until I was sixteen. I don't think I ever quite forgave him.

I started playing baseball in middle school and kept at it until college but it was around then that I decided girls were more important than baseball. Now looking back, I wish I would've realized that if I were to have focused on baseball, I would've gotten even more girls.

I was forty-two years old and was a bench coach for a high school baseball team. Baseball was always my passion, but I screwed around too much and now I'm too old to ever make anything happen. I don't have a wife or any children. My whole life is this high school team.

I was drinking alone at a bar one night, and realized every time I would have a dark/depressing thought, I would order a shot of whiskey to drown it down. The next thing I knew the bartender was belting out the Last Call alarm, and I proceeded to drink four more shots before calling a cab.

I stepped outside of the bar and had a smoke, and decided that I don't want to leave my car at the bar overnight, so I decided to drive home. I felt like I was a pretty good drunk driver, and was actually rather excited for the thrilling experience.

I embarked on the thirteen-minute ride home, and for the first ten minutes, the drive went smoothly. I was on the main road and saw that there was a car accident scene ahead, with firetrucks and police cars everywhere. I got distracted and ran through the red light, getting T-boned by a sober driver.

I awoke in a bright room, with angelic figures hovering over me. I felt a strange sense of calmness- as if all my anxiety and worries were never existent. The figures explained to me that I was dead, but had the option of returning to Earth. I would be trialing a new afterlife program called the "new life +". I would be given the chance to go back to Earth with all my previous knowledge. I was more than thrilled to try out the new experience and knew that I could become the next big thing in Major League Baseball history.

There was a minimal catch to the program. I would be placed back into Earth in the past as a newborn child, but I wouldn't be the same man I was. Instead, I would be assuming the body of my own son. In other words, if I choose to trial the "new life +", I will be born as my former life's son.

I asked the angelic figures who would be controlling my former self if I'm to be born as the son. I was told that my own dead father would be the one controlling the body I was familiar with. I would be giving him redemption for the terrible things he did to my mother and myself.

In the end, I decided to try the program.

I awoke as a newborn baby, unable to talk but fully comprehending the world around me. I looked up and saw my parents- a woman who I've never seen before, and my old past-time face and body. It was eerie to see myself as a separate entity, but I was too excited to become the world's best baseball player. All the coaches and prospects were going to learn the name Ken Griffey Jr.