What Would You Do?

 [Another reprint that no one read on first publication.]

Imagine it: what would you do if you were given the chance to start over? We’ve all been asked at one time or another, “If you had the chance to do your life over, what would you change?”

Most of us like to fantasize other scenarios our lives might have played out while still expecting to meet our loved ones but avoiding the mistakes. Most people wouldn’t give up a beloved spouse or children. But what if…

Movies have been written with this theme. Think of Rose in Titanic. Wealthy, engaged to a rich Englishman, she feels stifled by the second class existence she’ll live as his wife. When fate, in the form of an iceberg intervenes, she is given a second chance, and she runs with it. On the rescue ship, she gives a false name, and gives up her chance at wealth in a quest for happiness. By all accounts, she finds it.

Yes, it is a movie, but isn’t it just possible that some survivors of the Titanic – or the Lusitania or any other ship that sank – made similar choices, and took on new identities?

There are stories of members of the SS eluding authorities and moving to South America to start new lives, avoiding the prison sentences they deserved. No doubt other, lower ranking participants in the Second World War, or even those from other European countries trying to evade becoming soldiers found ways of disappearing and reappearing elsewhere years later with new identities.

Not everyone given that opportunity would do it. But not everyone who would do it is necessarily a bad person.

Imagine you’re in a bad relationship, but you’re significant other has threatened you harm if you ever try to leave. Imagine that on your way to work one sunny Tuesday, instead of going directly to your office on the 103^rd floor of the North Tower of the World Trade Center, you make a stop at a local drug store. As a result, you’re late for work, standing outside as the plane crashes into the building, your life saved. You can make the phone call telling people you’re all right or you can walk away, give up everything and start a new life.

While I don’t know quite how someone gets a new identity without being in witness protection, I can well imagine that at least a few people survived 9/11 as well as other disasters throughout the world,  who were listed as dead.

While it’s interesting to fantasize about what you would do if you were presented with the opportunity to start a new life, I’m also reminded of a Night Gallery episode from the 1970s in which a young man finds himself transported from nearly dying aboard the Titanic to waking up on the Lusitania. From there he escapes death once again to wake up on the Andrea Doria. I think the lesson to be learned is: Be careful what you wish for.