Like here and now? I’m going to revel in the joy of my healthy body. Then figure out how the fuck to look like my driver’s license picture and keep my head down while doing my best to enjoy life until I’m old enough looking to do something more significant.
Going back in time?
That’s a nightmare. At least at 16, I would stand a chance of shifting my choices just enough to end up in roughly the same current life, but with better options. But the chance of that is low as hell for anyone. Like, for all the bad shit I’ve dealt with, without it I would have never met my wife, or met some of the animal companions I’ve had the great luck to share my life with when I encountered them as strays.
The only thing I’d be willing to sacrifice all that for is trying to prevent one of my best friends from killing himself about three years later.
And that would be worth it, but I’d be losing a lot in the process. Life isn’t magic, where a do-over automatically means things are better. It’s just different. Like, the fantasy is that you’ll use your future knowledge to get rich and avoid all the bad things.
But the more you change your past, the more of the good you prevent along with the bad. And the ugly truth is that you still remember every fucking second of the bad. You don’t leave it behind, you’re still the same set of memories. Yeah, you’ll be building new ones, but there’s always going to be ghosts of your past casting shadows over your new present. And those new ones aren’t going to be like they would have if you’d taken that path when you were actually that old.
It’s still old you inside, so all the freshness of youth is missing.
Do-overs are terrifying, and the younger you’d be when you went back, the more horrific they get.
Damn, I didn’t even consider that it could mean to wake up right now with a 16yo body! That would be SO weird, imagine having to convince people that you’re still you despite possibly looking like your own child. Passport/driver’s license would be the least of my worries, a beard hides a lot and the facial bones don’t change that much.
Like here and now? I’m going to revel in the joy of my healthy body. Then figure out how the fuck to look like my driver’s license picture and keep my head down while doing my best to enjoy life until I’m old enough looking to do something more significant.
Going back in time?
That’s a nightmare. At least at 16, I would stand a chance of shifting my choices just enough to end up in roughly the same current life, but with better options. But the chance of that is low as hell for anyone. Like, for all the bad shit I’ve dealt with, without it I would have never met my wife, or met some of the animal companions I’ve had the great luck to share my life with when I encountered them as strays.
The only thing I’d be willing to sacrifice all that for is trying to prevent one of my best friends from killing himself about three years later.
And that would be worth it, but I’d be losing a lot in the process. Life isn’t magic, where a do-over automatically means things are better. It’s just different. Like, the fantasy is that you’ll use your future knowledge to get rich and avoid all the bad things.
But the more you change your past, the more of the good you prevent along with the bad. And the ugly truth is that you still remember every fucking second of the bad. You don’t leave it behind, you’re still the same set of memories. Yeah, you’ll be building new ones, but there’s always going to be ghosts of your past casting shadows over your new present. And those new ones aren’t going to be like they would have if you’d taken that path when you were actually that old.
It’s still old you inside, so all the freshness of youth is missing.
Do-overs are terrifying, and the younger you’d be when you went back, the more horrific they get.
Damn, I didn’t even consider that it could mean to wake up right now with a 16yo body! That would be SO weird, imagine having to convince people that you’re still you despite possibly looking like your own child. Passport/driver’s license would be the least of my worries, a beard hides a lot and the facial bones don’t change that much.