no regrets

Maybe there is one time I would time travel to...

My mom always jokes that she loves to live in regret. Mostly, it just comes up when she makes some big purchase - she'll question over and over again whether we should have gotten a Honda instead of a Hyundai or if we should have gotten the softer carpet or whether the pool tile should have been a darker blue.

I've inherited this from her in certain ways - a trait my neuroticism would inevitably embrace. I question every purchase I make and even the some of the most minuscule purchases have become an even bigger and more involved production than you could possibly imagine. Everyone in my wake gets roped in. Just a couple weeks ago, I involved Liz and Candace and Target's Customer Service in a flannel sheet purchase. But many will remember the great Macbook fiasco from earlier this year. The poor BestBuy Geek Squad won't forget me for a very long time.

In these huge and often complex purchases where I'm undoing or redoing purchases I should have made in the first place, I often think to myself, "I wish I could just go back and redo this whole thing. It would have made everything so much easier if I had just dyed my hair the right color in the first place."

But then, so often, once the process is complete, I am sure that I have what I want. I tried the other scenario and I knew it was the wrong thing, so I just made the change and it all worked out, like it literally ALWAYS does.

I think about this in terms of my life. There was a time when I would have loved to go back in time and change key decisions or conversations - those tiny moments that as it's turned out, are the cruxes of my story. I think about redoing the past because the future is so uncertain. I wonder if maybe I would feel more certain about the future had I done something different in the past. But the fact of the matter is that the future is always going to be uncertain. That's what is so exciting and scary about it all.

One of my favorite lines from the New Testament is this beautiful thought from Paul:

"For now, we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known." - 1 Corinthians 13:12

Time travel was the topic of one of the stories of This American Life today. It turns out that there are lots of various opinions on the subject. Go ahead and listen.

The more I think about it and the more I live, the more I wouldn't want to change a single thing. Plus, time travel is currently impossible, so it's a useless thought anyway. But even if it were an option, as of right now, I would opt out.

Eventually, all will become clear. Up until then, we can just take our sweet time.

"We're all traveling through time together, every day of our lives. All we can do is do our best to relish this remarkable ride. " - Tim, "About Time"
{This movie is "R" rated, but if you can find an edited copy or edit it yourself, you are in for a most wonderful treat.}

"...I have been time traveling, it's just that I've been traveling into the future, at 60 minutes per hour. And maybe that's how we fix the past?" - Sean Cole, This American Life Ep. 539

listening: "Sailingsong" by A Fine Frenzy