Being a poor time traveler must suck

I was once a young man who wanted to be an inventor.  Being heavy into sci-fi and movies especially, I idolized geniuses (at least in film)  my favorite movies were some of the best and worst movies of the 80's.  Notable hits like Real Geniuses, Revenge of the Nerds, My Science Project, Weird Science, The Explorers, Goonies, Back to the Future).  

It was unfortunate happenstance that two factors worked against me to put me at that level.  Being poor and having no direction and focus; something that still plagues me.  I am the victim and recipient of bad decisions, my own and of my parents.  On my mother's end, she did all that she was able too.  She was a single parent raising a child in the 70's, 80's and 90's.  She did what she could and I didn't make it easy, but she encouraged me to the best of her ability.  While I had a cheerleader growing up, what I needed was a coach.  I realized growing up that I had terrible study habits and my mother as much as she tried could not motivate me in the way I needed.

There wasn't anyone that could.



I grew up feeling smart and accomplished, but sometimes I wonder, was that just the cheers of a mother that didn't want to admit their child was a dumb as a box of rocks.

Somehow I managed to convince people that I was smart.  I did smart things, well except get good grades.  I spent a lot of time in libraries.  I read and collected a lot of books.  Education wise, I was horrible.  My grades were constantly bad to average.  I didn't care about school.  I cared about comics, videogames, computers, computer games, movies and technology.  I tinkered a lot as a kid.  I knew my way around tools.  I once crossed the fires to an electronic sewing machine to see what it would do.  I could have killed myself but it just blew a fuse.  I was so curious.  My mom bought me books like How Things Work.  She did her best to encourage me.  I grew up believing that I was an intelligent, rational, well-informed individual, but I never felt like I was "smart".  Maybe it's that impostor syndrome issue that most people face.

I continued through my days this way.

Along the way I discovered something that literally helps me sleep at night.  It's a bit of a truth about myself.

Inside there is a fire that burns non stop.

When I hit my thirties I started thinking about my own mortality.

When I hit my forties, it all started to change.

I started thinking about the pursuits that I always wanted to take on, but never did.  My brain; that part of me that is attached to both my hopes and dreams and that part of me that is hungry to grow started seeing things and putting them aside.  Sometimes I realized I was doing it; other times I did not. 

My brain would be like:

"oh yeah, we need that...not for right now, for later." 

and I'd end up hoarding information like a fucking junkie.  Even something obscure like a background picture in a videogame like Spider-Man for the PS4.  I'm doing my Peter Parker while playing Peter Parker, but I'm also collecting this information, visual reference for something that as far as I know; I am unable to do.

I was not planning on going to college or tradeschool as I'm well planted into the notion of making money now and now going further in debt, but my brain seemed to have other ideas.  My brain is collecting this data for some hereto undescribed stint into potential supervillany and I'm the understudy, plodding along studying the script while clueless.  Just doing my job sort of shtick.  I know as a rational person that his is all fake (the stuff in the Spider-Man game I mean.)  It's concepts of things that do not physically exist and have not been replicated successfully.

I know this, but my brain; that stubborn 5lb mass of goo; will not accept this.  

My brain is subprocessing behind my back.  

It's looking for something and it will not give up.  I tried to rationalize a lot of what I do as a person as being motivated by some intrinsic reason or justified purpose.

I'm just a man; a soul trapped in a flesh biosuit for the sole purpose of figuring my sole purpose and then executing that task.  

My brain has secrets or maybe I'm just nuts.  It has some sort of goal that it wants to accomplish and of course it's using me to do so.  My brain is kind of seperate from me.  There are things in it that I cannot access.  What's the point of all this?

If you've managed to get this far then congrats, you've listened to me ramble for reasons I do not know, but the honest truth is, I (the person) feel like my brain is trying to grow where I (the person) feels they cannot.  It's trying to convince me to do things that I have never tried doing before.  

My brain really feels like it's not a part of me at times and I wonder if that's a legitimate sign of mental illness.  

Needless to say; my brain really is trying to grow.   It's trying to learn robotics, programming, raspberry pi, machine learning, A.I. and even if I cannot comprehend it, my brain is determined to find a way around that.  

I'd like to believe that in my soggy mass is that fire, because my heart would love for things to be easy and simple.  I'd love to lounge around and be lazy, but my brain has other plans.  

"It wants to design practical solutions for everyday problems."

  It knows and therefore I know that in order to do so we must learn and will likely die learning; but learning has been what our life has been about.

My brain knows that we are likely headed for a very tech heavy future.  My brain saw the Internet as did many; but we knew what it could become.  We were prepared to take advantage of that.  My brain knows the tech singularity will create the opportunities for those who even have a remote understanding of the subjects and items and accessories that will come as a result.  

My brain finally opens up, just a little.  Like an IT stepping out of it's office.

It's telling me to seek the cares and concerns of the potential future while you are still able. 

It tells me to learn what I can for as long as I can, because the future will grow and it will need thinkers. 

My brain tells me that we can still be inventors and "the world can be saved by Steam" exhaling a small cloud.  It's not too late, but there is much to do.

 It will need people who understand the technology and desire to create.  

My brain operates in the future.  

It always has.