Time After Time

TOO EARLY THE OTHER MORNING I was up and scampering about, unable to sleep. I had the TV tuned to TCM and watched a movie made back in 1979 – “Time After Time.”

“Time After Time” came out shortly after I’d moved to San Francisco. The movie was filmed there and it was fun to see places in town that I knew.

The storyline was about H.G. Wells, the author of “The Time Machine,” using his invention to chase after Jack the Ripper who had used Wells’ Time Machine to leap ahead in Time to modern day (1979) San Francisco. It was a fun little thriller of a movie, but I bring it up today because it got me to thinking – a dangerous activity even on a good and well rested day for me.

I began to think about Time and its possibly fluid nature. Could it be navigated like a river – upstream and down? If it could be would I be tempted to dive in? Would you?

If we could travel in Time would we go forward into the Future or would we choose to go back into History? Almost more importantly and interesting to me is the question of why would we decide to go Whenever?

I mused my way through a good portion of the movie that night because I let my mind wander off like a curious puppy.

Going into the Future is, indeed, an intriguing thought – to see how things turned out with the world and personally. Do today’s little nieces and nephews do good and wonderful things? Are they happy? Does the world solve its problems or does it sink into darkness?

The idea of popping into the Tomorrow of a hundred years from now, or a thousand, is most alluring and also fearful. What if the baser motives of some people make those tomorrows into a vale of tears? Maybe going into the Future should be left to unfurl one day at a time.

What about taking our little Time Machine into the Past? Hmmm?

There are parts of my life that I wouldn’t mind reliving or at least watching play out from the sidelines. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to see departed loved ones again or to see them as we remember them in our youth? Would this give us the chance to make amends or comfort their fears? Or would we go back in Time and attempt to literally change History – even though doing so could have catastrophic repercussions on the Future? “The best laid plans of mice and men…” and all that. Even today the choices we make alter all of our tomorrows.

I spent several hours bouncing this idea around like a tennis ball and, to be truthful, I couldn’t come to a decision.

Tomorrow or Yesterday?

Both offer possibilities that are/were/will be wonderful and nightmarish.

As with too many things that I muse on for any length of time I tend to eventually think of an old joke or story relating to it all. The same thing happened with this business of temporal transport.

“I know a fellow who says that he has invented a Time Machine. He has modified his favorite Barcalounger Recliner chair so he can travel through Time. He is still trying to work out a few bugs in his invention. So far he can only go forward in Time and it is very slow. He told me that he can relax in his chair, hit the switch and he is transported into tomorrow. The only problem is that to go ahead one full day takes him 24 hours.”

Bada Bing, Bada Boom.

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