Let's pretend that I was killed on that day, when I wasn't.

The day when my guardian angel managed to throw my F-86F half a second from becoming a fireball in the desert, up into a clear sky, way above what would have been the impact point.

If she hadn't done this, if she hadn't spared my life time after time in the 80-some years that we've been together, I wouldn't have written this book that brings those strange times together, and suggests why we choose any lifetime in the first place.

For 78 of those years, I had no idea that she existed, hadn't heard about guardian angels and what their job might be. Hadn't heard that our angel stays with us from the minute we're born till the time that our mission is done, and we come home to the place we call heaven.

Today I've just about finished a lifetime, and at last I can understand what it is that we do as mortals, and why we choose these over all the other possibilities.

Thank you, dear guardian angel, and please consider that with your consent and signature, our contract will extend to yet another lifetime.

Richard Bach is the author of 25 books, including Jonathan Livingston Seagull, Illusions, and The Bridge Across Forever. His books have sold tens of millions in over 40 languages throughout the world. Back to back, his work has been on the New York Times best seller lists for more than four years. He deals, most simply and effectively, with ideas that have the power to change the world.