“lowlight photography of white pocket watch” by Rodion Kutsaev on Unsplash

Groundhog Day

Kai Chan
Kai Chan
Sep 1, 2018 · 3 min read

This is part of my experiment to write regularly and publish every day with the help of 365 Days of Writing Prompts. Today’s prompt: “In the comedy ‘Groundhog Day’ Bill Murray experienced the same day again and again, stuck in a time loop until he got the day ‘right.’ What day would you choose to repeat until you got it right? Do you think it’s ever possible to get life ‘right’?”

I am not sure if it is possible to get life “right”, but I would rather not repeat a day until I got it right.

Believe it or not, even though Groundhog Day was released in 1993, over two decades ago, I had not watched it until about three years ago. My Toastmasters club once used the movie as the meeting theme. I had never learned about either the tradition or the movie. My curiosity drove me to look into both.

However, I grew up as a fan of the Back to the Future movie trilogy. That was where I learned not to mess the normal flow of with time. Trust me. You do not want to unravel the space-time continuum and end up kissing your parent. You have been warned!

Anyway, the way Phil Connors (Bill Murray’s character in the movie) was stuck in a time loop was not fun. How? Exactly how long Phil was trapped in the time loop was not revealed in the movie. However, Simon Gallagher at Obsessed With Film once worked out an estimate of 12,403 days, or 33 years and 358 days. In fact, once Phil found out that he was trapped, he was so devastated to break out that he tried to drive a car off a cliff. Let’s just say that the movie would have been cut short. If I had to repeat one day for that many times, I would have been so hopelessly bored that I might not even try to work on things like he did.

If Phil were trapped in a multi-day time loop, that might have made things more interesting. However, Phil was trapped into a one-day loop. As long as he was trapped, he could not be in any other day of the year except Groundhog Day. He cannot celebrate Christmas on Christmas Day, for example. He could not do something to others and see what happened in the next day, such as painting a house and let it dry overnight. The day would have been reset before he could find out.

For many people, getting one right does not necessarily makes a huge difference. For example, if I wish I had pursued a different career, preparing to get into such career would have likely required much longer than one day, even if I could have lived one of those days many times, and especially when I cannot.

It takes so much effort to get one day “right”, even in a hypothetical situation. Even then, I do not think I will be satisfied. As soon as I move on to the next day, that day’s imperfection would stand out even more. There are definitely days that sometimes I wish I could go back and change. The problem is that there are so many days like this, even being able to get one of them right is not good enough. I guess I will just stick to reality.

Written by

Kai Chan

Changing the world that talks too much, one piece of writing at a time. Leading the leaders, when they can lead and when they cannot.

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