The old man’s rheumy eyes fell upon the dusty box in the corner of the shed. Labeled “School Stuff,” it had been hiding in this corner for seven decades untouched. How old was he now? He had lost track of the years after all that had happened in the world and in his life.

In the shed the man also spied a car’s old rear view mirror, dust-covered and spider-webbed. It was something he had not wanted to throw out, no doubt. But why? The mirror would have been useless except on the car it was made for.

A stray thought came to him. His memory had deteriorated over the years, but he recalled taking a class with Mr. B? Ba…?  What was his name again? Mr. Bachmann! That was it. In opening up the box, he was pleased to find some of his old writings from high school which sparked his memory of writing day-long sentences within month-long essays.

In one of the ancient, musty smelling folders he found a piece that he had written for Mr. Bachmann’s class. It was dated 2015! It was all becoming much more vivid. The distortions in his memory—like antique, wavy glass—faded. Thoughts and feelings of school rushed back to him. The frosted soccer field on cold winter mornings, wrought iron fences casting italicized shadows on the ground, the rumble of the nearby freeway. Time turned back on itself, and those days on campus were no longer the past. They appeared in his mind as if he were back there, right now. He lost his train of thought for a moment. What was it that some long-dead author wrote? “So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” Yes. That’s all there was now. The past.

He smiled. Gently setting down the rear view mirror, he picked up the piece he had written for Mr. Bachmann. It was presciently titled “Once and Future.” It began: “The old man’s rheumy eyes fell upon the dusty box in the corner of the shed….”