On this 11/22, Fifty-Nine Years Later

As I mentioned in Saturday's article, I've just finished reading Stephen King's epic time travel classic 11/22/63...for the sixth time.  Although I'm a fan of King's I typically don't reread his stuff like that...what is the case with this particular novel?  I did like his chief protagonist Jake Epping, whose first-person narration is perhaps the best in any story I've ever read.  And the character of Al Templeton...the man who has discovered a time portal that transports anyone entering it back to a specific moment in September, 1958..is remarkable, especially with regard to how he interprets his discovery and applies it.  But after giving it some thought, I think the main thing I took from the book is something that needs no magic pathway into the past.  It's all, after all, a simple thought experiment.  Although Epping and Templeton did their time traveling as 2011 adults transplanted into a mid-twentieth century environment, my experiment has me, with my present so-called wisdom and knowledge, conveniently entering my own distant past at what I now consider pivotal times of my youth...and then acting differently from what I actually did.  So, for example, maybe instead of my poor study habits back then I set up a regular homework routine and religiously adhered to it.  The resulting good grades and improved relationships with my teachers would also lead to different social relationships with my peers...and differing expectations and new challenges.  But would I be well-equipped for all the changes going on around me including possible adversity from my own parents (people tend to be resistant to change in others, even for the better)...after all, the further I progress in my "new' past life the more novel experiences I will have and no way of determining their positive or negative (and possibly tragic) outcomes.  In a way, this is what Epping discovered in 11/22/63...so let's go further on with that thought experiment.  Suppose I take that regret about my past...poor study habits or something else that comes to mind...and since I don't have a time portal to "remedy" things, instead I simply apply the changed behavior to my present moments, here in good old 2022?  And it's here, I think, where I feel the attraction for Stephen King's best novel, in my opinion.  Templeton sets the goal of preventing the assassination of John F. Kennedy in Dallas on November 22, 1963 and Epping is left to complete the task.  I was in the second grade, just having come back to the classroom after lunch, when the terrible event was announced to us.  At home my parents left the TV on with its nonstop coverage of the aftermath...I think that affected me more than the actual initial news.  After all, I was only barely seven and wasn't exactly filled in on what was going on politically...