A Second Chance

by Timothy Paterson

a sales representative and he was on the road a lot of the time. He worked twelve hours a day, six to seven days per week. As John continued watching the screen, he saw several instances when his father was too tired to play with him.

  John had long ago blocked these bad memories from his thoughts, but they were still there, even though well hidden, and they all came back to him now.

  Suddenly, the scene changed. Up to this point, the scenes had been in chronological order, but now, it had jumped from him at age seven, to him as an adult. John watched, as his son Tom, at age eight, asked his dad to throw a football around with him. John told him that he was too busy to play with him. Another scene showed Katie at age six, asking her dad to play Barbie dolls with her, and still yet, another scene showed Brian at age nine asking his father to watch him pitch at his little league game. In each of these instances, John was too busy or too tired.

  John looked up at his guide and started to speak, but the guide told John, to just watch and learn.

  As Robin sat in the waiting room with her children, she was feeling very guilty. She thought that she was responsible for John having a heart attack; after all, she had just told him to move out. "If I hadn't been so mad at him this morning" she thought, "he wouldn't be fighting for his life right now."

  Robin looked over at her children and she could tell that they were scared and worried. Brian looked devastated. He loved his father so much and now, he may lose him forever.

  As John's life continued to pass by on the screen, John was filled with many different emotions. He started crying, as he watched his mother die from a burst appendix when he was twelve years old.

  As John watched his mother's funeral, he wanted to turn away, but he could not. It was as if he was trying to find pieces of memories that were hidden in the deep recesses of his mind.

  After his mother died, John's father worked more hours and began drinking, to help him forget his pain. He became stricter with John.

  John watched several scenes where his father became very angry with him when he played music too loud, or when his friends were at the house and were having too much fun.

  John tried to talk to his father about his mother, but it was a topic that was not allowed to be mentioned in the house and John would get hit if he was too close to his father when he mentioned her.

  Once again, the scenes fast-forwarded into the recent past. They showed John getting very angry and losing his temper when his children argued, or were too loud. John realized that he was controlling his wife and kids just as his father had controlled his mother and him.

  Word of John's heart attack had spread through town, among John's employees and his business associates. Several of them went to the hospital to console Robin. Robin began to realize how many other people's lives were connected to John through his job. He was responsible to over sixty employees who worked for him. She realized how much stress he must have been under at work.

  As John's employees came to console her and check on John's condition, she began to realize that they were like a family to him, and he to them.

  John was now watching his teenage years unfold before him on the big screen. John's father was rarely home and when he was at home, he was very critical of everything that John did. John could do nothing right in his father's eyes.

  John's father would not let him date until he was seventeen. John asked permission to get a tattoo. His father told him "Absolutely not. I forbid it." John got a tattoo anyway. It was a rose; his mother's favorite flower, on his right shoulder.

  When John's father found out about the tattoo, he beat John with a belt. That was when John really started to resent his father. As John was reminded of these incidents, his resentment towards his father resurfaced.

  Once again, the scenes jumped ahead into the present. John saw himself being overcritical of his own children. He saw himself telling Katie that she could not wear makeup or start dating until she was seventeen.

  Another scene had just happened a few weeks earlier. Tom had asked if he could get his ear pierced. John had told him "Absolutely not! I forbid it!"

  One of the final scenes was of John's high school graduation. John's father expected John to join the company where he worked and be a sales representative like him. When John mentioned college, his father told him to forget the idea. "You think that you are better than your old man?" he asked John.

  Just after the graduation ceremony, John told his father that he had been accepted to the University of Illinois, where he had secretly applied.

  His father was furious, when he heard the news. He told John that he wanted him and his things out of the house that night and as far as he was concerned, John was no longer hi son.

  After arguing with his father for twenty minutes and getting nowhere, John went home and began packing his things. When he had loaded everything into his car, he drove away from the house and he never saw his father again.

  When John was a sophomore in college, John received word that his father had died. John saw his final words to his father replayed on the screen. At high school graduation, he told his father; "I hate you and I wouldn't care if you died tomorrow."

  As the screen went blank, John just sat there, overcome by many emotions; love, hate, loneliness, despair, and fear.

  After a moment of silence, John spoke to his guide; "I have become just like my father. I have turned out just like him. I have treated my family terribly for several years. I know that there is no way that I will ever get into Heaven, for what I have done with my life. My hate for my father eventually destroyed me. I wish that I could just start over. I really do love my wife and children, and I want them to feel loved. They deserved to be treated with respect and dignity."

  The guide was silent for a few minutes and finally he spoke. "You have learned from your past mistakes and have shown remorse and regret. Therefore, it has been decided that you will be given one more chance at life."

  John asked the guide; "How much time will I have left?"

  The guide replied; "You may have a few days, or several years. Only God knows the exact amount of time, so use the time wisely. Love your family and love yourself.

  Before John was to return to his earthly body, he asked the guide for a favor. "I now know that my father wasn't as bad as I thought. He had misguided priorities just as I have had, and I know that he was grieving for my mother in his own way. Could you please tell him that I forgive him and that I love him?"

  The guide stood there for a moment. Then, slowly, he removed the hood that was covering his head and face, so that John could see his face clearly for the first time. Then he spoke to John; "Thank you, my son. I love you and I am sorry for the way I treated you." For the first time in over twenty years, John was standing face to face with his father. John wrapped his arms around his father and started sobbing.

  Robin and her children sat around John's bed in the Cardiac Recovery Unit. He had tubes coming out of his chest and he was hooked up to a couple of IV's. He also had a tube in his throat helping him to breathe.

  All of a sudden, Brian said, "Look Mom, Dad's crying." As they all watched, they saw tears streaming down John's cheeks. A moment later, John's eyes opened up.

  As John looked around, he saw that he was in a hospital room surrounded by his family. This was his second chance, a chance to make things right. As he looked at his wife and his children, the tears continued to flow.

  When the doctor removed the tube from his throat, John looked into Robin's eyes and said; "I am so sorry for everything that I have put you and the kids through these past several years. I have been such a jerk. I love all of you so much. I have not been the husband and father that I could have been and should have been. God has given me a second chance. I hope that all of you will too.

  Wiping away her tears, Robin gave John a hug
and told him that they could start over, from that moment, forward.

  Then, John hugged each of his children, and held them so tight because he never wanted to lose them again.

  John remained in the hospital for the rest of the week. When he was alone, he made a number of secret phone calls and had a few secret meetings in his hospital room when his family was not there.

  When John was released from the hospital, he insisted on taking his family out to dinner to celebrate his second chance at life.

  The restaurant was the fanciest one in town, with the best food, although John only ate food that was on his new heart healthy diet. John wanted to be around for many more years.

  After diner, John told his family that there was something he wanted to say to them. He told them about his experience in the "Garden of Reflections". "I saw myself as others saw me and I didn't like what I saw. I had become just like my own father, who I hated. I had blocked out my youth from my memory, because of him, but in the end, I ended up acting just like him."

  "I am so sorry for my behavior over these past several years. If God allows it, I will be around for several years. I am changing the priorities in my life, starting right now."

  Then, John took four wrapped presents from a bag he had been holding since he left the hospital. He gave a present to each of his children and one to