Time Travel or I Can't Believe I Did That

Have you ever wondered why time is so one-way and restrictive? Like, why am I here right now instead of yesterday before that big mistake I made or tomorrow after that horrible thing I dread?

A Brief Story:

When I was but a lad—and also a Mormon missionary—I once borrowed a television from the local church meetinghouse. Some other missionaries were coming to visit for the night, and one of them wanted to show us some videos he'd shot. As I lifted it out of the car, the cord fell down far enough to drag on the ground.

"I should pick that up so I don't trip on it," I thought. Then I thought, "Nyah, I'll just be careful." I would have had to set the TV down, and it was an old boxy one, partly made of wood, and quite heavy.

You can see what's coming can't you?

I carried the TV with the screen against my chest and my arms around the sides far enough to grab the bottom. It was pretty well balanced. When I stepped on the cord—like you knew I would—it pulled the back of the TV just enough to tip it out of my hands and onto the sidewalk right outside our apartment.

There was a crunch. And a hiss. And I watched a circle in the middle of the screen darken. I knew exactly how bad the damage was.

And in that moment, I experienced the awful linearity of time. That WHY DID I DO THAT? feeling. It would have been so easy NOT to drop the TV. I shouldn't have even been borrowing it in the first place! What business did I have TAKING a TV from the CHURCH, let alone BREAKING IT?!

I would have given anything to get a second chance at the previous three seconds.

Stuff like that still happens to me, though not usually that bad. There was the could-have-been-fatal car mishap on an icy curve. The email with some unfortunate wording. Other stuff. Like, say, blog posts.

*SIGH*

You know, the guy I had to call and tell I broke the TV was terrifying, but it wasn't so bad. When the branch got together to watch General Conference a few months later, he publicly thanked me for making it possible for them to get a brand new TV. It was humbling, as stupid mistakes always are.

Comments

  1. great story. And we've ALL been there in some form or another...

    Where did you go?

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  2. I believe there are no coincidences. Those things do happen for a reason and they happen to everyone! (At least I haven't met a person who hasn't experienced something similar.) We all need them I think. I hope you're okay!

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  3. My biggest take-away from this is... Mormon missionary, huh? I come from a family of missionaries. Baptists though. It's always interesting to see a fellow writer with a similar background.

    My instinct when these things happen is to hit the undo button. Ctrl+Z. It's a totally non-phased reaction, "Oh I'll just hit undo," until I realize I'm not on a computer.

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  4. Yeah, two years around Melbourne, Australia.

    The Undo feature is the greatest thing ever conceived for computers. Life's a little trickier.

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  5. Hey I've been to Melbourne! And Geelong. There was a soccer team there and their team song was like "We are Geelong, we're always on the ball!" Random memory.

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  6. "We'll play the game as it should be played, at home or far aWAY!"

    That's enough.

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  7. Why did you go to Melbourne? Just for fun? Better yet, why'd you go to Geelong? Did you love it?

    Now I'm trying to remember the Aussie version of a Christmas song I learned, but I can't even remember which song it was. But it was hilarious.

    Oh! It was Jingle Bells. "Dashing through the bush/in a rusty Holden ute/Kicking up the dust/Esky in the boot..."

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  8. I went there on a "missions trip" during college. Not like we did a lot of missions work. Really, it was a glorified "see the world" trip, as missions trips often are. I mean, I've been on legit missions trips where we actually help build buildings, paint stuff, etc. But this one was a lot of nancing around. Basically, we went to churches and entertained people.

    God, I sound like a bad Christian now.

    Yes, I loved Australia. Geelong reminded me of Texas, where I live. A lot of open space.

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  9. Oh, it was a 5 week "missions trip." Which was the main reason I picked it. You don't get a feel for a country with a 1 week deal.

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