Iannuccilli: Can I Go Backward in Time?

Iannuccilli: Can I Go Backward in Time?

I cannot seem to get off this business of time, probably because I wanted to travel back in that dimension when I went to Ellis Island recently. I was trying to grasp, picture, what was happening when my grandparents arrived. No, not what was happening in history, but what was going on with them as they looked to the future. I wanted to find a way to be there. Of course, I could not.

Time travel means moving forward, or backward (really?), to different points in time, much like you might move between different points in space. Physicists define time as the progression of events from the past to present into the future. If a system is unchanging, it is timeless. OK. Time is not something we can see, touch, or taste, but we can measure its passage. I think I understand that. However, as I reflect on my grandparents’ experiences, I realize I can only measure those events in my memory.

I appreciate that time is temporary and irreversible. What I want to do is grasp it, grasp the past, and put myself there so I can fathom further what those immigrants felt.  How do I travel back?  Forget the physicists, psychologists and space scientists. I’ve read enough of their ‘takes’ on time. I recognize that the key is merely in my mind.

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For example, time seems to speed up as we get older. Psychologists have shown that adults perceive time as moving faster than it did when they were children. I didn’t need a psychologist to tell me that. I could have told them. Forget speed. I want time to be so slow that is goes backward.

Most of us can equate time with places we have been. No, I am not talking about travel. I am talking about neighborhoods and events … the home run off the house, the schoolyard where you pitched cards, the terror of walking from the movies at night. I can tell you when those things happened and where I was. Where were you when …?

This I understand: Time is the progression of events from the past into the future. For non-scientists, time moves only in one direction. It's possible to move forward in time, but not backward. When we were kids, we were carefree in wishing time away. “I wish I were old enough to drive, I can’t wait to go to the movies on my own, I wish I were old enough to drink.

So, how do I travel back? With pictures, stories, memories, and imagination. What is the key? I guess it’s about where I want to be. And the only way I can recreate it is with images, awareness, chats with relatives, writing and places like Ellis Island.

Imagine, more than 12 million immigrants made their first stop in America at the Ellis Island Immigration Station between 1892 and 1954, and my grandparents were among them.

I see them in the crowd.

 

Ed Iannuccilli is the author of "Growing up Italian" and "What Ever Happened to Sunday Dinner?" and "My Story Continues"  can be found here.