Back in Time

For "The Writer's Cramp"  - the prompt:
You run across a "Time Machine"... Travel back to a particular moment in your life where you know (now) that you made the wrong choice and write a story about what might've have happened if you made the right choice.

This piece is a work of fiction - in other words, the events depicted below did not really happen to me. However, the sentiment expressed is mine.

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Journal Entry - June 14, 2003

The most amazing thing happened to me today - while at the Museum of Science and History, I came across a Jules Verne exhibit which included a replica of one of his time travel machines. Museum visitors were invited to sit inside the machine and "take a trip back in time" - kind of a cheesy gimmick but I thought it might be fun, plus it was the only way I could see what was inside.

After waiting in a long line it was finally my turn to take a "trip" back in time. I took my seat, drew the curtain for privacy, and took a look around the cabin of the time machine. There were all sorts of knobs and dials, and a digital calendar of sorts which included instructions about choosing a date to which to travel back. There was also a TV Monitor, probably to display some sort of video images of the time period you chose to visit.

So I sat back, thought about what date I wanted to return to, and then all hell broke loose. I meant to enter June 15, 1776, since I love Revolutionary War stuff and was interested in the days just before the Declaration of Independence was signed. After I entered the date I sat back to enjoy the video show that would help me "go back in time." However, I set a date for June 15, 1976 by mistake, which I didn't realize until it was too late.

Because as soon as I entered the date, the computer panel started sparking and smoking, and the video display monitor flashed on and off. I figured "Oh great, I broke the dumb thing! Way to go, Clumsy!" And I decided if I exited on the other side of the time machine without opening the entrance curtain, maybe no one would know it was me who did it.

But before I could get out of the seat, a safety harness came down from the back of the chair, snapped me back into the seat before buckling itself into place, and I was jolted forward at such a high rate of speed I think I must have passed out for a few seconds. When I came to, there was blackness, like space, with occasional bursts of light out of the corners of my eyes, and a whooshing sound all around me. And then, after I don’t know how long, I came to a sudden stop, and a blinding light flashed in my eyes.

I’m condensing a lot of things that happened into a short amount of space here because I want to get to the main point of what happened. Maybe later I’ll come back and add more details to this journal entry. For now I just want to get it down before I forget the impact of what happened next.

When I caught my breath and my eyes cleared of the “after-flash” effect, I was able to look around. Everything seemed so familiar – in a dreamy sort of way. I recognized my old high school, and after a while, some of my high school friends, all dressed in that obnoxious 1970’s colorful polyester fashion with no sign of John Adams or Benjamin Franklin anywhere.

Right about the time my best friend Teri approached me and called my name, flipping her hair and snapping her gum, I realized that I had gone back in time to 1976 – to the last day of my senior year in high school. I was wearing bell-bottom hip-huggers and snapping gum of my own, and Teri was asking me if I was ready to leave or did I need to get anyone else to sign my year book.

With a shudder I realized what was about to happen – this was the day that Teri and I would get into a car accident which would scar me for life, both literally and figuratively. Teri and I had been on our way home to change for a pool party at a friend’s house when a car out of nowhere ran a stop sign and hit the passenger side of the car going over 50mph. Teri miraculously only had minor injuries, but I sustained some pretty serious injuries and burns before they could cut me out of the car, and it changed my life forever.

I froze, realizing that in this moment I could have my life back – I could tell Teri to wait, sign a few more yearbooks, and miss the accident altogether. And then I’d go on to live the pain-free, carefree life of the rising tennis star that I had been living before the accident. No surgeries, no skin grafts - I’d be able to cash in on my tennis scholarship to UCLA, go to law school, become a lawyer, live in Malibu with my husband, dog, and two kids.

But it was just then I stopped short. If I hadn’t had the accident, I never would have ended up in that rehab hospital in Santa Barbara where I met Melissa, who has been my best friend ever since. I’d have never considered going to college to become a psychologist, specializing in working with disabled children. And most importantly, I’d have never met Doug, the love of my life, my husband of the past 18 years.

I was at a crossroads – I had a choice to make. Stall Teri and miss the accident, and live the life I was supposed to live before that car hit us. Or go with her now, and return to the life I knew and loved in spite of all the pain and suffering.

Another shudder passed through me, and the kind of chill one gets when someone walks across your grave, I suppose. And then I knew what I had to do, as I followed Teri to her Mustang. I had no other choice, I had to live my destiny, and return to the life I knew, and to the person I'd become because of what I'd been through.

I wouldn't be me, otherwise, and I couldn't lose all that now. I'd come too far.