The Inner Monologue

Let’s be real: time travel stories are wildly optimistic about how well-adjusted their protagonists are in the past (or future). Sure, Marty McFly nails 1955 like he was born there, and Outlander’s Claire Fraser somehow doesn’t immediately die of dysentery while also sounding like she stepped out of a BBC period drama. But in reality? You’d last about five minutes before someone burned you as a witch, locked you up as a lunatic, or just straight-up mugged you for your weird futuristic gear.

1. You’re Basically a Walking Plague Rat

Congratulations, time traveler! You’ve arrived in 1348. Unfortunately, so have all the diseases you’ve been casually carrying since childhood. Measles? Mumps? The common cold? To medieval peasants, you’re Patient Zero of the apocalypse. And let’s not even talk about what you’d catch—drinking the water in 1850 would give you more parasites than a Survivor contestant.

Even if you go forward, good luck. Future humans probably have immune systems tuned to space flu, and you’ll spend your trip sneezing into a futuristic hazmat suit while the locals side-eye you like you’re Typhoid Mary.

2. Your Outfit Screams “I Don’t Belong Here”

Think you can just throw on a doublet and blend into 1600s London? First of all, your posture is all wrong. Your teeth are way too good. And oh yeah—your nylon backpack, polyester jacket, and plastic water bottle might as well be glowing neon signs that say “ALIEN SPY.”

And if you go to the future? Hope you enjoy explaining why you’re wearing pants like some kind of primitive savage. (“Wait, you mean you separated your leg coverings from your torso coverings? How… quaint.”)

3. You Talk Like a Bad Shakespearean Actor

Language evolves fast. Go back 200 years and you’ll sound like a pretentious theatre kid. Go back 500 and you might as well be speaking Klingon. Even simple phrases like “OK” or “cool” would get you blank stares (or worse, accusations of witchcraft).

And if you think you’d have trouble, imagine some poor Victorian gentleman time-hopping to today:

Him: “Prithee, where might I locate a public telephonic exchange?”
You: “Uh… you mean a phone?”
Him: “A what?”
You: “You… you just use your pocket computer.”
Him: (faints dramatically onto a fainting couch)

4. Your Everyday Objects Are Either Magic or Worth a Fortune

That Bic lighter in your pocket? In the Middle Ages, that’s sorcery. That aluminum water bottle? Before the 1880s, aluminum was rarer than platinum. You could trade a single Coke can for a castle and still have change.

But good luck explaining any of it. Try convincing a medieval blacksmith that your “magic fire stick” isn’t demonic. Or that your “glowing rectangle” (phone) isn’t stealing souls. Spoiler: You’re getting exorcised.

5. You Have No Survival Skills

Unless you’re a historian with a side hobby in blacksmithing, you’re useless in the past. Could you start a fire without matches? Identify edible plants? Operate a loom? No? Then enjoy starving to death while people whisper about the idiot who didn’t know how to churn butter.

And if you go to the future? You’ll be the equivalent of your grandpa trying to use Netflix. *”Wait, you mean you don’t *click* the icon, you just think at it?!”*

Conclusion: Time Travel is a One-Way Ticket to Disaster

Unless you’re prepared to:

• Get every vaccine ever invented
• Master at least three dead languages
• Learn how to spin wool like a 12th-century peasant
• Explain why your shoes have lights in them

…then time travel isn’t for you. Stick to history books. At least there, no one can smell your deodorant and declare you a heretic.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go practice my Old English in case I ever get yeeted to the Dark Ages. Wes þū hāl! (Which, by the way, does NOT mean “What’s up, dude?”)