Ostomy Memories Travels Through Time

FOR WEEKS, I’VE BEEN HEARING BANGING and tinkering noises coming from my neighbor’s garage.  Then, just the other day, we were both out getting our mail at the same time so I asked him about it.  “I’ve built a time machine,” he told me.  “I know that sounds crazy,” he continued, “but I’ve tried it and it works.”  I feigned interest.  “I can tell from your expression that you’re doubtful,” he said, and then he offered to show me.  It looked legitimate enough.  “You want to go to the past or the future?” he asked.  I humored him.  “Oh, how about thirty years into the future?” I said, smiling.  “Get in,” he said with a serious look on his face.  “I’ll just set it for one hour in the year 2052,” he said, then closed me into the damn contraption.  After a lot of whistling and humming, the interior of his garage disappeared, there was some wispy fog and smoke, and all of a sudden, I was in a narrow alley somewhere.  I got out and wandered around.  There was a small café on the corner, so I went in.  “Coffee, please,” I told the waitress.  “That’ll be $28, in advance,” she told me, holding out her hand.  I didn’t have it.  “That’s kind of steep,” I said, and at the same time I noticed the calendar on the wall:  December, 2052.  The guy sitting nearest to me looked over.  “That’s what a cup of java costs these days, my friend.  Where’ve you been?”  “How come?”  “Greenhouse gas emissions,” he said, “destroying the coffee bean crops worldwide.  Same with wine, rice, lots of things.”  “But I thought,” I stammered, “I thought we were diminishing coal use in favor of natural gas and renewables.”  “Yeh, we were,” he told me, “but India, China and the rest of Asia increased fossil fuel use so much that it erased any benefit from closing our own coal plants.”  Glancing at my watch, I said, “I gotta go” and dashed out, found the time machine in the alley, got back in and, soon enough, I was returned to my neighbor’s garage, shaken but intact.  “What do you think?” he asked me.  “I gotta go,” I repeated, and hurried back into my house, went to the kitchen, cranked up the coffee maker, and settled down with a good-smelling cup of Columbian Supremo.  “Honey,” I called out to my wife, “can you freeze coffee beans?”   

Hello HenryM. 

Your neighbour's time machine seems to have an inbuilt optimism about what will still be around in 2052. A result of global warming is likely to be severe weather patterns, shortages of water and accompanying ironic flooding; civil unrest, wars , and the increasing likelihood that the human race will embark on a self-destructive path that may be irreversible. The price of coffee will be among the least of our worries.
Fortunately, if the human race is obliterated, the rest of the natural world will probably benefit beyond the present recognition of it. 
At my age, these are things that are not likely to affect my 'life' and I doubt whether they will have much affect upon my death.

All I can do is offer my condolences to those few who may live to survive these bleak times.

Best wishes

Bill 

Kinda on topic although not the environmental bit.

There is a terrific, in my opinion, show on Netflix called DARK, it has to do with time travel, secrets and loss of loved ones. I watched all 26 episodes last week and loved every second of it. This is not a show for casual watching as you will miss something if it is just on for background noise then be lost with the plot, which is already difficult to follow. The creators of this show are also responsible for 1899 which also deals with time travel.

I highly recommend both programs. Dark is 26 episodes, so far 1899 is 8 episodes waiting for renewal.

As always. Thank you Henry for this mornings post, by the way you can freeze coffee beans but not for 25-50 years. Speaking of which it’s now time for me to enjoy my one cup of caffeinated coffee then one cup of decaf. Chemo dehydrates me so caffeine I have to be very careful with, no more hospital in 2022 for me so long as I’m careful. 

My kids and their generation are highly aware of their future and it's not optimistic, which is so sad because we at least had that. This is, unfortunately, the way of the world; two steps forward and three steps back, every gain replaced with an eventual loss because not everyone thinks or behaves alike. Henry, what stood out for me is the fact that everything other than the human race will benefit. Maybe they're biding their time until all of us knuckleheads are gone.

Thanks for the recommendation. This show looks great. Now go enjoy your one cup of regular coffee and I'm sipping my one cup!

I'm sure you're right.  Whatever living things survive us will be better off without us.  

How can I jump into that machine? I want to go back twenty years in time for a specific reason. Don't want a peek into the future, having a hard enough time with the present. As to the demise of Homo sapiens, it won't happen, they are the most adaptive species of all, I know dogs are very adaptable also. If God forbid humans fail the others won't make it either. They will find a way around climate change through grit and new technology. A hit from a roaming meteorite would be more dangerous.

Hello Bowsprit.
I do like your optimism, your beliefs, and your hopes.

It is probably true that humans are the most adaptive species. Unfortunately, they have also proved themselves to be the most destructive species. 
I agree that if humans fail/die, many other species will die also. However, the point being that, whatever is left , whether it is just cockroaches, trees ,grass or other non-human things, will be better off without the destructiveness of  homo sapiens.. 
I too think that humans have the ‘capacity’ for finding solutions to the climate crisis. However. my view is that human greed (in all its forms)  is presently far more powerful than the desire or will to change. Therefore, human destruction of the planet’s resources will probably continue to the point where it may be too late for their other ingeniousness and inventiveness to turn things around. 
A hit from a roaming meteorite is certainly dangerous, but seems a much less likely event than a deliberate nuclear war between humans, or a continuation of the culture of greed that is taking us on a path of self-destruction. 
‘HOPE’ is a ongoing human trait which can be helpful to enable us to ‘carry on’. However, hope can cause a form of blindness to logic and reality, which can stifle the very changes that are needed to rectify the problems we face.  
One of the things I have noticed about ‘hope’, is that those greedy humans among us have found ways to persuade their fellow humans that they should ‘invest’ their meagre wealth in the ‘hope’ of personal ‘profit’. Thus, perpetuating the culture of greed throughout the species.  Have you noticed how gambling has become popular and ‘normalised’. There is a saying amongst non-gamblers, that it is only the ‘bankers’  who profit.  It seems that the ‘elites’ in most human societies are willing to encourage us all to ‘gamble our futures’ for the sake of their personal profits. 
I find that good rant is quite cathartic, even if it is unlikely to change things in the ‘real’ world. 

Best wishes

Bill

A good rant, Bill, and I agree with you.  Economics always trumps environmental concerns, it always has, and there's no reason to believe that will change.

Without disagreeing with what you have written, I would beg to point out that Homo sapiens has survived on this planet for more than 2,000,000 years and through all sorts of catastrophic events including the Ice age. Historical records indicate that climate has changed during the past 1,000 years at centennial timescales; that is, no two centuries have been exactly alike. The Earth system has undergone dramatic changes throughout its 4.5 billion year history. These have included climatic changes diverse in mechanisms, magnitudes, rates and consequences. The Cenozoic Era encompassing the past 65.5 million years, the time that has elapsed since the mass extinction event has a broad range of climatic variations characterized by alternating intervals of global warming and cooling. If you are suggesting that humankind is on its way to extinction due to the many follies on its part such as widespread commercialization, or fiddling with nuclear weaponry then that is another story.
Best wishes

Hello Bowsprit.

You make some very pertinent points about climate changes, and in your last line you touch on almost precisely what I am referring to. 

Best wishes 

Bill

Hi Bill,   Very wise words.  I agree with you 100%.  I do believe that we humans have brought this planet to the point, where it's all downhill from here.  I just don't see us pulling ourselves out of this path to destruction.  I feel lucky that I was born into the generation that I was, and feel sorrow for the kids of today and the future they have to look forward to.  I still try to play whatever small part I can in terms of climate change, despite having little optimism.  I do what I can in terms of our political system, again without much hope.  What else can you do?

Terry