Being born in the wrong generation

At this point, it is mostly annoying when someone says that they think of themselves as being born in the wrong generation. This is because most people who say such a thing are inherently annoying to begin with, and want to seem like a cool, outsider type, who does not get along with today’s generation – not because the sentiment by itself is so wrong. In my opinion, there are many reasons why someone would want to go back in time; the degradation of pop-culture, climate change, the frightening rate at which technology is advancing are some of the most valid. Many people seem to be under the wrong impression that the world used to be more peaceful – clearly, they only remember the smoking of copious amounts of weed from the sixties. When asked which period in time they would travel back to, a majority of people would choose a time and place from the last 100 years or so. If it were me, however, I would go back much further, and take back what is rightfully mine – as I too, have been born in the wrong generation.

I invented the urinal

It must have been a regular day in October, almost thirteen years ago exactly, when a five-year-old me had, quite possibly, one of the greatest ideas of all time. Vividly, I remember pacing in circles within the confines of my bedroom when suddenly, inspiration hit me like a sack of bricks. Hastily, I dashed across the grounds of the apartment in which my family resided at the time, so that I could tell someone, anyone, about my revolutionary invention. Fate had its way that day, for if it had been my mother in the living room, and not my father, things would have gone down a lot differently. Alas, it was my father, who was relaxing whilst sitting on the couch when I told him of what my brain had cooked up mere moments ago. What if, in a public men’s room, there were toilets that you could use… whilst standing. Now, now, don’t laugh, for if it had not already been invented before that day, every single human male would be in my debt. Of course, it had, but I don’t think that that is of much relevance. Many times, I’ve gone over that day in my head and wondered what my mother would have said, perhaps something along the lines of: “you know, that already exists, and it’s called a urinal.” My father took a different approach, nonchalantly saying: “why, my son, that’s a great idea,” without taking his eyes off the newspaper he was reading. Full of pride, I went back to my room. Many months later, I actually went into a public men’s room and spotted a urinal. Possibly the most shockingly stupid part of this story is how I reacted upon sighting it. I did not think: “Oh, this exists?” or even: “Who stole my idea?” Instead, I just thought to myself: “They actually made it? Neat,” as if my idea, which had never left the confines of my family’s apartment, somehow reached city planners. I believe that I was nine years old when this repressed memory finally resurfaced in my mind and I realized that I might have been a very stupid child.

My time travel power fantasy

That being said, my objective could not be any more clear – Even though I was kind of a moronic child, if I had been born many years earlier, it could have been me, a child genius, who invented the toilet. Delving even further into this hypothetical scenario, I feel like there are many things that I could have invented if I had actually had the chance to. Spoons, bowls, wheels, chairs, tables; all elementary to a prodigious inventor such as myself. The only thing holding me back from having invented them is the unfortunate time of my birth. Oh well, it seems as though, in the future, I am destined to invent things that are far greater than a simple urinal, which shall be no challenge to me, as I already invented that at the very ripe age of five. But rest assured – if time travel ever becomes possible, you better sleep with one eye open, Andrew Rankin! (Apparently, he patented the modern design of the urinal. That rat-bastard.)

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