It's a familiar fantasy. By magically rolling back the clock, you'd suddenly have a teenager's thin and athletic body again. You'd have all your life in front of you. And most importantly, perhaps, you'd be able to 'start again' and avoid all the mistakes you've made in your life.
This fantasy is shared by Mike O'Donnell in the recent Hollywood film 17 Again. Mike
gives up on a scholarship when he is 17 to marry his sweetheart who is pregnant. And he spends the next 20 years in a bad mood. He should have gone into higher education. He would have been a basketball superstar. And his wife is the culprit! She 'forced' him into choosing early family life.Of course, with such a reproachful husband, divorce is her only alternative and 37 year old Mike finds himself living without his wife and on non-speaking terms with his two kids. And so he wishes he were 17 Again.
And he gets the chance when a bit of Hollywood-style magic lets him wake up as his 17 year old former self, ready to start student life again.
Rather than spoil the plot, let's just cut to the moral of the story. Mike eventually discovers that, for him, the importance of being a teenager, once again, is not that it allows him to cut it, once more, on the basketball court. Nor is it about being sexually attractive to young women. Given the chance to rejuvenate, he finds that he uses the opportunity to pursue what he truly wants most of all in life. And that is to get really close to his wife and protect and nurture his kids.I watched the film with my family last night and I came away agreeing with the moral of the story. Aiming to rejuvenate is not, ultimately, about giving yourself a teenage make-over. But rather, it's about: renewing your ability to see what is positive and real in your life today; having a reborn ambition to strive for these goals; and rediscovering the dynamic energy to make them happen.
