Inconsequential Oddments Vaguely Connected by Time.

I was doing some manual work in the garden earlier and a thought occurred to me. When I was a young man doing manual work, there was often some kind of overseer present who would chivvy me into putting more effort into the job. ‘Put your back into it’ he would say aggressively, or something similar. Now I’d be much more likely to hear a young woman’s voice saying ‘Are you sure you should be doing that, Granddad? Please be careful.’ Shameful, isn’t it?

And I keep seeing my face reflected in mirrors and shop windows. I really am having difficulty reconciling it with the self image still occupying my brain.

*  *  *

I was watching the film Twelve Monkeys earlier and another thought struck me (based on the rationale of the film.) Let’s suppose I really could travel back in time just few decades, and let’s suppose I met my younger self and gave him some advice. He might take the advice to heart and do something different some way down the road, and that might change his destiny. It might even cause him to die, in which case I wouldn’t exist in my own present and therefore couldn’t have travelled back. It’s the same principle as what I believe is called ‘the grandfather syndrome.’

And that takes us back into the territory of time lines and parallel universes again. I’m not sure I can be bothered with such speculation any more. No point. I wrote the theory into a short story which got published. I think that will do.

*  *  *

I had a visitor this evening and between us we sorted one of the issues with the car. The cause was what I thought it was. Aren’t I clever? He also brought me a belated Christmas present – a bottle of whisky and a box of assorted chocolate biscuits. He gives me a Christmas present most years, which I don’t understand because I never give him one. And he isn’t usually late.

(Incidentally, I haven't posted for a few days because there was an impediment. Never mind what it was. And I've been talking to a Russian and a Swede on YouTube. That's my idea of excitement.)