Yeah, that's the power of.... in Book One: The Not So Daily Briefs 2014

So... a while back in my "politics" section I did a write up about Time Travel. You needn't have read that to understand what I am writing here... but I wanted to bring attention to it, to suggest exactly how much of a "nerd" I am.

Thought Detour: As my final year of law school comes to a close, I was giving thought to how much of a "nerd" I am and something struck me. Law school didn't fundamentally change WHO I was; but it aided me SIGNIFICANTLY in accepting who I was. Meeting people who liked Comic Books, and Board Games, and Thought Puzzles as much as I did? I mean... hell, High School AND College were both places where a desire to learn, a love of learning were all considered... somehow "lesser." I have NEVER understood how college students, people who have to PAY for UNREQUIRED education can still look at education as "pointless" and "uncool." If you go to college... try. Try to learn, try to read, demand that you receive the benefit of what you are paying for... otherwise, why are you paying for it?! But... it took until Law School to meet people with my interests, my passions... I suppose what I am saying is that.... it really took until Law School to make any "real friends" (barring a few exceptions over the years). It has been wonderful to finally be able to stand up and say "I am a trivia freak, star trek geek, star wars nerd that loves comic books does NOT know much about computers and wants to spend every weekend DnDing!"

Anyway... before I ever accepted how much of a "nerd" I was... I still acted, in many ways, as a nerd. For instance, I was raised on the old Universal Monster Movies... Dracula, Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein, Creature From the Black Lagoon, Wolfman; all of those. But, even as a youngster, I knew that all of those movies were BASED on something... and not just an individual novel but on cultural stories and myths. I mean, hell, I was reading Greek and Norse Mythology texts by the time I was 7... I knew these Universal Monsters had to be something similar. The most intriguing and most legendary creatures were Were-Beasts and Vampires and I studied them!! I don't mean, to mock the current age, "twilight fandom where yay vampires".... I mean.... even at 10 years old, I searched through histories of mythology and tribal stories. I went from the 1989 New York Cult of Vampire to the Scandinavian Foot Vampires back to the ancient BCE Soul Takers. I studied the Were-Bears of indigenous tribes, the Were-Panthers of Brazil, the Were-Wolves of Germany... even the odd myths that suggested there were hybrid creatures wherein a vampire that was improperly staked would become a werewolf (never quite understood how that one was supposed to work). I tell you truly, I inhaled any scholarly item about Vampires & Were-Beasts I could find.

I was much the same with Time Travel. I remember the first time I developed a concept of time-as-relative-to-understanding... and how I was mocked for it. Granted, at 9 years old suggesting that time is anything but a concrete linear concept is sure to make kids pick on you... but damnit, I love(d) using my mind. The reason I am writing today, though, is because... I honestly don't know how other humans in this world view time and time travel.... and especially as "daylight savings time" ends... I figured it was a good time to mention it.

WHAT FOLLOWS ARE PRESUMPTIONS... I WANT TO KNOW IF I ASSUME TOO MUCH

From conversations and observations.... it seems most people who say they want to "go back in time" believe one thing and mean another. What they say sounds like they want to take their present form, transport it to a different time within their own timeline, and affect things on their own behalf. But I've always thought that was rife with complications. Not only is there HUGE potential for problems in any time stream where there are TWO of you... but how can you properly affect things when you shouldn't technically exist? For instance... lets take a selfish but common idea.... "travel back in time to get moderately wealthy." How? By going back in time to invest a small amount of money into Microsoft before it makes it huge? Contemplate that. Would you go back in time and pay in cash? CAN'T! Cash minted AFTER the period of time in which you are would be, justifiably, treated as counterfeit. Create a stock account in your own name? Maybe... you could pretend that you were your own uncle opening an account as a present.... but then all the information and details would go to your youthful self... who would be asked (by the IRS on your 1090 if nothing else) all sorts of unanswerable questions... and the investment wouldn't succeed. Of course you could play the "I'd have a long conversation with myself" card but... seriously? That is never smart. I've dedicated 5 years of my life to the various ways in which FUTURE/PAST self discussions could happen... and most of the quantum consequences frighten me.

Ultimately... what most people would want to do (and God knows I want to)... is to take their present consciousness, their present self... and move the INFORMATION back in time. To treat the concept like a computer... most people don't want the hardware placed in an earlier timeslot... they want to move the software. This has always fascinated me, both because I would like to do it and because the ramifications are disastrously interesting. Really think about it.

Here's an innocent for-instance. FOR INSTANCE: I would love to transfer my consciousness back to my first leading role in 1997. I was auditioning for the villain, but was cast as the hero. As far as characters go... villain was "traditional bad guy", hero was "traditional good guy", sidekick was "guy who got all the laughs." For fans of Buffy the Vampire Slayer... I was an average white kid from Iowa and I was playing "Cowboy Guy." Thing is... being the Hero wasn't bad. The director specifically said I had talent and could easily play villains if I wanted to in the future... but she wanted to cast me as the Hero to let me experience the part of a Lead Role. I was disappointed and upset. Yes... imagine that... an actor who is disappointed and upset at being the lead! But I didn't want to be Cowboy Guy- morally upstanding unintelligent swell person.... I wanted to be Bad Guy- ambitious genius grasping at power. Because of my immaturity and short-sightedness... I didn't enjoy the leading role as much as I should have. I would like to go back and re-do it so I can do it the best I can and appreciate the role properly. BUT even such a small, seemingly unimportant thing would have far-reaching consequences.

It's still something I'd like to do, though. Imagine that... a man who isn't afraid of death... who thinks of reincarnation as the ultimate expression of hell... but wouldn't mind taking all the knowledge he has and going back to the start of his own life to re-live. I suppose that directly plays into how I view video games as well. I love beginnings. But I want to do them AS PERFECTLY AS POSSIBLE. So... for instance... a game like the Elder Scrolls series... I'll play that thing all the way through a dozen times before I'm satisfied. Because I might create the CHARACTER I want... but I won't play that character the way I wanted to had I known X, Y Z. Like... all characters I create based on myself rely on stealth, intelligence, speechcraft, and magic. BUT... I might get to the third mission and find out the whole thing relies on strength. I will straight up start the game over to make a character that can better handle the early levels. Hell... until I hit a double-digit level in most games, I'll restart with "proper build concepts" in mind.

It's just interesting. And certainly not a personality trait that helps me enjoy my life at present. I spend far too much time considering how I would have done things differently.