Changemaker Diaries

"We shouldn't be in here!" Amanda cried in a whimpery whisper, "Come on, we have to go, Saully!"

I grimaced. She knew better than to call me that. I was going by Mike now, not Saul. I decided that the second I found out my dad was posted to Baden, Germany.

I wasn't going to be the same old Saul Michael Winters, skinny, bespectacled kid from CFB Gagetown. Nope, 1984 was going to be my year. And it was going to be as Mike Winters, clever, cool, and adventurous. I'd still have the glasses. There was no choice in that, couldn't see without them.

"Shut up Manda Panda," I snarled softly. I knew that would get her. She hated that nickname. My buddy Jimi gave it to her in grade 3 when she wore black and white on picture day. And, I won't lie, she was a chubby girl back then, she looked like a baby panda bear.

She didn't now. She grew about 7 inches in the past year and became tall and slim. The one thing that hadn't changed, well, two things were her stunning doll-like face and her sharp wit. Oh, and she was still a chicken. I guess that's three things.

"Saully," She cried, "I'm serious!"

We were someplace we weren't supposed to be. I knew it. She knew it. Nobody else did. My dad, her dad, and everyone else's dad were down at the pub having an after-work beer. My dad didn't drink, per se, he was probably having a Coke, but still.

Building A-17 was a little one storey shack really. But everyone said there was a whole lot more underground. It was one of the only buildings on base with a big "Keep Out: Authorized Military Personnel Only" sign. Jimi dared us, me, specifically to break in and see what was there.

Jimi and Amanda were posted around the same time as me. Our parents were all in the Princess Pat Infantry. Jimi's father was a Captain and that made him a bit big-feeling and a bit of a bully sometimes like he thought he was captain of us. He kinda was. He was handsome, like, crazy handsome, popular, and smart. We weren't.

He stood guard outside as we snooped around. There wasn't much to see really just a bunch of files on shelves on walls.

"Look, Saul," Amanda pointed to a spot in the floor. It was about 2x2 feet and looked like a trap door. There was a small handle, like one you'd find on a kitchen cupboard.

I pulled on it and it opened. I looked back at her and she shuffled nervously, pushing her red hair behind her ears.

"You coming?" I asked.

She shook her head, so I went in on my own. I descended the stairs. It smelled like rot. You know how it smells when potatoes get watery and gross? It was like that. I put my red Police t-shirt over my nose. The Police, like Sting, not the actual cops.

At the bottom of the landing, I looked around after my eyes adjusted to the darkness. I didn't see much. I stepped in further. There wasn't anything at all. Books and boxes. That was it. What a bust!

I kept walking, slowly, gingerly. There was a folder on the floor. I picked it up. It said, "DND Time Travel Operations." My heart jumped about a million miles. This was exciting.

I opened it. There was a lot of mumbo jumbo, but the long and short of it was that the Canadian Army had found a portal, a space-time thing. It was behind the west wall upstairs. Pull Volume 21 of Encyclopedia Britannica and there it was!

I ran back upstairs, file in hand! I was so excited! You have no idea. I showed it to Amanda. She scoffed. She was dismissive. I didn't like her tone.

"This is foolish, it's not real," she said.

"Then why is the Army hiding it?" I challenged.

She had no answer.

I found the relevant encyclopedia and pulled it. The wall turned around instantly. I looked at my friend, she shook her head and ran.

I stepped inside. It was dark. It was a hollow feeling. A huge mainframe was in front of me asking me to set a date.

A date? I had no idea of a date. I hadn't thought far ahead. I didn't think any of this was an actual thing.

It kept blinking at me, "Enter Date Please."

I had nothing. I should have paid more attention in History class. I stood there looking at this huge computer taunting me.

What would I change in history if I had a chance? Think fast! Only one thing came to mind, World War II and the Holocaust. That's two, but one, you know. And I mean, you've already guessed by now I'm Jewish. Nobody who isn't Jewish names their kid Saul.

I thought some more trying desperately to recall some of my history lessons. I chose December 4, 1907. It was random, but far enough back, maybe, just maybe, you know.

I punched the numbers into the mainframe and felt a tingling. It wasn't pain or pressure, just tingling as if every cell in my body was being moved around.

Then nothing. I was just there. I was dressed funny and I was older, maybe 26, 30. I was sitting at a table with three other people, another man, with a bushy beard and mutton chops and a smart-looking woman. My woolen suit made me itch.

A handful of people entered the room and took their places before tripods with canvases and paint already set up.

The woman stood up and said a few words in German. I don't know much German, but I understood every word. She told them they were welcome to the Vienna Academy of Art's Second Level Audition.

She said a few other things and then gave them their task, to paint a figure from the Bible or history.

As everyone got to work, I watched. There was one applicant, a short, awkward fellow, almost sickly looking, with dark hair and eyes, that appeared uncomfortable.

I can't tell you why, but he made me very uneasy. His energy was bad, off somehow. His eyes were dark and vacant, dead. And despite his stature, he stood like he thought he was the tallest man in the room.

I don't know if you've ever met someone you instantly disliked, but I felt like that about this kid. Evil seemed to waft from him.

When the 30 minutes were up, the three of us went around and scored the pieces. Some were very good. Some were not. We had 12 spots to fill. Ten were easily taken.

There was some debate about numbers 11 and 12.

The little man, the one with the darkness in his eyes, his work had no feeling, no soul. There was no emotion at all. His figures lacked all sense of humanity. It was as if he couldn't get into the human headspace.

But he had technical ability. His landscape and architectural work were decent enough. Certainly not great, but sufficiently good for artistic purposes.

He intrigued and terrified me. I was sure the person he was wasn't anyone I wanted to know. I still wasn't sure who he was. But he looked like a bad cat. I could feel evil and doom in his presence as he stood there, smirking proudly as if he'd just won a prize.

I sat there, wanting to hate him. Wanting to say no, but something took over and I said yes. I can't tell you why. Maybe I wanted to keep him off the street. I'm not sure. All I know is in that blind test (blind in that we didn't know their names until we made out choices), something larger than me took over and picked him.

Two months later, Adolph Hitler got his acceptance letter to the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts. And I knew I changed the world.

He entered the school in the fall of 1908 and by all accounts was a mediocre student at best.

He developed a cough sometime around the second semester and doctors determined it was TB, likely from his time on the street. He stayed on for a while and then withdrew when his health couldn't withstand study.

He died the following June, unknown, alone in a charity home for the wayward. His grave is unmarked. From all the talk on campus, it was a painful and miserable death.

And then, more tingling. I was back. Back in the cellar. Back in Baden. The woolen suit was gone. I ran upstairs to tell Amanda. She wasn't there.

I went to her house. It was after midnight. I threw a stone at her window. She opened it and jumped out. She was only on the second floor.

I told her everything! She didn't believe me at first but when I told her the entire story, she did.

She was mad at me for leaving so early. She said I didn't change anything yet, that I needed to see the story through. I'm not sure how to do that, I was taken out. I didn't leave. I tingled, I was there, I was at the school, and then there were flashes of a few months later and Hitler was dead, then more tingling, and I was back in Germany, on the base in 1984.

We're going back tomorrow with Jimi and we're going to set the clock to January 29, 1933. Amanda picked the date. She said it's the day before the election became final so I think it'll be good. And I'll finally get to meet my grandmother.