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Hindsight

Album: 41: In Hot Pursuit

Episode: 521

Lesson/Theme: The value of every life; the value of every moment

Bible Verse: Luke 10:27

Characters: Liz, Whit, Rodney

Writer: Marshal Younger

Sound Designer: Bob Luttrell

Original Air Date: June 14, 2003

Last Air Date: April 28, 2005

Description:
Liz is in the Room of Consequence, where Whit is trying out a new program. Liz gets to be the guinea pig. She is sent three years into her future. Since it’s not a time machine, it’s simply a possible future for her. The idea is that you see a consequence of a choice before you see the choice itself. When Liz arrives in the future, she wakes up in the hospital. The nurse says she suffered a blow to her head and the police are waiting to question her. She travels back in time thirty minutes, where she’s mopping the floor at a convenience store. Norton, a classmate from Odyssey Middle School busts in to rob the convenience store. In the meantime, Liz slips and falls on the freshly mopped floor. She then travels back in time three years. She arrives at Mandy’s house as police are escorting Norton out in handcuffs. He broke into their house to steal their television. After time backs up another few minutes, she sees that it was herself who found him at the house in the first place, so she must have called the police. A day before this incident, Liz is at the Bones of Rath clubhouse. She overhears Norton trying to join the Bones by getting a television for their clubhouse. He tells Rodney that his family loaned a television to Mandy’s family. He’s told to get it back, even though they’re on vacation. Liz wonders how all of these things involve her and how a choice she made has anything to do with Norton. She then sees that she was someone who influenced Norton into trying to find friends like Rodney. She wasn’t his friend and refused to sit by him on the bus. When she’s given the chance again, she chooses to ask Norton to sit beside her, even if the other kids are making fun of her. When time is fast-forwarded, she realizes that she has now gained a friend and Norton hasn’t made the decision to join the Bones of Rath after all.

Questions:
Why did Liz wake up in the hospital? Who was Norton becoming friends with? What did he have to do for them to be included? Liz befriended Norton and stuck up for him when no one else would. What can you do to make new friends and help others feel included?