Time And Space

A hundred years ago, when I first came out to visit the Bay Area with little thought of settling down, I was asked by my girlfriend what I would like to do when I got there. My first notion: Disneyland. This came primarily as a geographical issue that had escaped me. California is a great big state. Colorado, from whence I was coming, could be traversed, north to south pretty easily in a day, even in the non-hybrid horseless carriages that were available at that time.
For real: In the late 1990's, the best idea I could come up with for a romantic getaway with the woman who would become my wife was to travel three hundred and seventy-one miles to an amusement park. At this point, feel free to point out that geography may not have been the only issue for me at the time. It was in the same state, and wouldn't it be fun to spend a few hours in the car together, getting reacquainted and talking about all those things that we never got a chance to when we had to pay long distance charges. Remember long distance charges?
To make the long journey's story short, six-plus hours in a car is plenty of time to get reacquainted, and just about enough time to start wondering why I didn't pick a destination that was a tad more local to her base of operations. No matter. It's history now, part of a tale that still brings me a smile when I think about what a good sport I had for a girlfriend and how much I still had to learn about relative distances on the West Coast.
Now I find out that, if I'm patient, we could make that same trip in thirty minutes. Not half a day. Half an hour. Once the Hyperloop is in place, we could be in Los Angeles n a matter of minutes. Elon Musk, the man who brought us the Tesla electric sports car and SpaceX the space cargo company, wants to bring his enthusiasms for high speed and electricity and magnets together to shoot travelers around the country in underground vacuum tubes.
Will it really happen? There are plenty of doubters, including myself. I'm still waiting on that personal jetpack. But if you could get me to the front of the line before the House of Mouse opens, even if I wake up in Oakland, then I probably won't need the ride on Space Mountain. I could use that time standing in line to get caught up with my wife.