A Thousand Years

My story began a thousand years ago. Okay, not my story, exactly. I mean, I was born in '87. But for the purposes of the story I'm about to tell, it began a thousand years ago. It began with a monk named Byrhtferth and his Manual.

See, a lot of people haven't even heard of Byrhtferth or his work. But he was kind of brilliant. Most of Byrhtferth's Manual is just a computus. Basically, that's a calculation of when Easter should fall in the year. But if you ask me, that's just what's seen on the surface of this great work.

Scratch that surface, and you see that it was written by a man who had an incredible grasp on how our universe works. The man could use mathematics and simple numbers to explain the order of things in our world. Things that we see as chaos can be explained through equations as a part of that universal order.

Byrhtferth lived and worked at Ramsey Abbey in England. I've visited what's left of the old place, hoping to find even a little more evidence of the man's genius. Each time I've been there, I've come up short. But I'm undeterred. I have no doubt that there is more to what he left behind.

I'm not crazy. I have no grand notions that I'll find some key to unlock absolute power. But I do firmly believe that it will be possible to come up with logical ways to predict future events for our planet, and even our solar system. I just need to get inside the mind of a man who died so long ago.

Think about it. Equations that can tell us when and where the next major earthquake will strike. Equations that will predict the force and exact path of a hurricane. What if we could predict when and where a tornado would touch down? What if we knew exactly how bad the next wave of solar flares would be? We could have foreknowledge of all these disasters and be better prepared to face them when they come. The possibilities are endless.

I just need a little more time, a little more study. I know I can unlock these numbers. The secret of life is almost within my reach.

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