I would only consider it if I could use my current knowledge. The lessons I learned since 2008 have to be maintained, I am a much better person now. I’d do some things different though.  

My Bonnie had her stroke in 2007.  I wouldn’t change that.  While I would emotionally spare her the pain of the event and living in her own body the way she does now, the stroke was my escape.  It was my chance to do things differently and maintan that.

By June of 2007, that time with big Kahlil was coming to an end.  I wouldn’t mourn that, or fight so hard for a life in Nevada.  Time has shown that even though I learned a lesson in 2010, leaving him at that moment wouldn’t impair me. Shit it would spare me 2011 and that fucking shit show which led up to B and Andrea. 

I would have noticed faster the move Valerie was trying to make and I could prevent that long struggle. What did I learn from that struggle? I can’t say that I learned Valerie wasn’t shit, I already knew that.  

I suppose I learned that the rest of the ‘family’ wasn’t worth the oxygen wasted on them, but weren’t they a non factor anyhow? I would learn that the two people who call her mother, who I raised as a sister and a son had her tendencies and I could cut them loose earlier.  The heartache from that wouldn’t change, instead I wouldn’t have to learn that they sold Bonnie out for a used Chrysler car and the thought that the’d finally get the house on Limekiln.  Folks sell their souls pretty cheap. 

I wouldn’t run up the debt I did.  I would have stayed at CCIS and where would that have taken me?  That is a question I don’t have the answer for, an unknown. 

Bonnie would have gone into assisted living much earlier and my Clyde and I would have fled Limekiln to make a different life.

You have to wonder if that different life would still get me to this moment?  I mean I’m dragging my memories along for the ride so that should count for something yes?

I would still understand the things I do today, I could lessen some pain for both me and Clyde as I do it.  Can you imagine a world where I don’t spend a month in a mental hospital in 2014 instead I am running Vizionz Coaching then?  Daddy said, well we might never have met if I go back in time. 

We would have though.  The lightening would already have hit us the first time.

He hadn’t touched me yet though in 2008. That is a thing, and those summer months back when he was still August 4 hadn’t happened.  Something very special happened then, and I don’t know if they would still happen if I were altering timelines. 

While I could all the way avoid Andrea, I would not have my spoon.  

While I would carry the memories of my time at the Summer House, I would not have endured them.  I would no longer chuckle every time I bought toilet paper. 

I would not be here typing this on the porch.  The events hadn’t yet happened which put those 2 people together that leads to me living here.  Even if I want more than this porch, this porch is amazing in more ways than I can type right now. 

I’d like to think know what I know now, I’d pull the trigger and work on assisted living for Clyde, but that is not certain.  I’d be carrying the weight of knowing what it’s like to wake up in the morning without his laughter and I don’t know if that is something in any time line I am prepared to manage. 

Maybe I’d watch a series of unfortunate events happen to Thomas and Alito and Kennedy in 2010. That could be my for humanity moment. I’d combine that with making sure the House and Senate stayed dark blue in the midterms as well.  What progress could we have truly made with those alterations?

Would I still be me though? Would I have this passion for living? Would I go to sleep at night, missing his arms but knowing that I will feel them again?  Would he reject me then, because he didn’t know what was coming.  That what his life would present would prepare him for the love we now have?

Would it present the people we are right now and prepare us for the future we will have? Our future whenever COVID chills the fuck out is going to be amazing. 

Or maybe…..just maybe….. I could stand still in this moment and be thankful that Earth-2 isn’t an option. After all life is pretty good right now, in this moment.  Perfect? Hardly.  It’s amazing in so many ways though. And it’s the result of all the things that happened from 2008 to typing these words. Sure I’d like to have the financial security of those Zoom stock dividend checks and be working on ‘challenge’ #30 where there’s a Facebook group of 12,000 people waiting to send me money to alter their trajectory. 

If changing one thing though means that my Bonnie and Clyde weren’t cared for, that I would not be this resilient, that there was a chance I would not love the man I love currently I would not risk it. Now that I finally get to live and love on my terms…..there’s no way in hell or heaven or anything in between I’d forfeit that. 

I’d twerk for a new MacBook though…ijs