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Answers come easier than people think. You just have to ask the right questions. If I really did go back in time, then my new memories should be old memories for everyone else. I decided to sit down with Rich and get the facts straight. Part of me didn't want to, didn't want to know. It was better to believe things as I did, that Jason was right, that I didn't go back. Still, I had to know. I would go insane if I didn't find out.
I chose Rich because it was the safest choice. Talking to my mother would require bringing up my grandmother's death and my strange behavior during that time. I didn't want to open old wounds. My father offered the same difficulties. Rich would think I was nuts, but that wouldn't at all alter his opinion of me. He'd called me nuts several times in my life.
Rich chose to meet me at Ruth's Chris Steakhouse in Garden City, the same place I had laid it on the line to Tanya just a short time before. She hadn't called like Rich predicted. That didn't mean I didn't think about the fact that she didn't call. Sure, I was dating Darlene, but the remnants of the relationship with Tanya stayed strong. I wanted to reach inside and rip whatever it was that kept me thinking about her out. I didn't know where to start, the head or the heart. I never admitted this sort of addiction to anyone else. I couldn't tell Rich; I would only expose myself to pain. If I told Tanya, she'd see it as some ray of hope, some small, smoldering ember that could later ignite a relationship I thought best snuffed out. Of course, I am telling this from my side, as if my perspective and perception is absolutely perfect.
Rich had gotten to the steakhouse before me. He sat a the bar, facing the front door. The place was quiet, with only two other people at the bar, and a handful of tables occupied in the dining room, scattered about. Rich smoked a cigarette, a beer in front of him. The bartender, Larry, was a friend of mine. I wished he wasn't working. I didn't want him to overhear the conversation. We could have sat down at a table, but I can't tell you the last time I remember going to a restaurant with Rich that we actually ate.
"Dr. Camponi," Rich said as I walked over, "who'd you kill?"
"No one, yet," I said.
"Being sued?"
"Nope."
I sat down on the stool to the left of Rich.
"Then what sort of legal advice to you need?" Rich asked.
"None. That's not why I asked you here. It is something else."
"What else? You said you wanted to pick my brain."
"Not exactly much to pick."
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Update #1: 8/18/02
It would have taken me forever to figure out whether or not I visited the past. Left to my own devices, I probably nevr would have come to the correct conclusion, or any conclusion, for that matter. The evidence pointed in both directions, especially the fact that, though I spent plenty of time in the past, I hadn't changed a damn thing in the future. I had to have affected something. I needed an answer.
My mother finding the high school ring certainly was a clue. It made me think differently about the situation. If my mother wouldn't have found it, I would have believed Jason when he told me that I never went back. The ring changed things. My question was, what? The mind can play games. I didn't remember everything as it was when I went back. There were subtle changes. Or were there? Maybe my mind hand altered my memories just enough to make them more palatable. I've caught myself doing this before. My memories of how much money I have lost in casinos has always been fuzzy, the math even fuzzier. Maybe I really did go back, and maybe things were different because my memories were wrong. There was one way to find out. I just needed the guts to go ahead with it.
Update #2 11/16/02