When I was a small girl, I used to feel a nameless dread when I looked directly up at the stars at night (those days you could see a lot of stars in the sky even in urban areas). I was not scared if other objects were in my field of vision. It used to make me feel deeply lonely...as if I lived alone on one of those stellar objects. The feeling passed after a few years. Then quite recently, in my middle age, I felt a similar fear at the thought that time was unidirectional. ...that you can't go back in time, filled me with the same dread....not just because I will die sooner or later, but at some other level. The fact that you cannot go back and forth in time is scary, but at the same time, would I like to be transported back and forth erratically? I dont think so.

There is a novel by Fred Hoyle called "October the first is too late" that I had read in my college days. The book has anidea that is comforting in this situation. I try to convincce myself that it's very likely that time can also be accessed in a nonlinear fashion....why not? It's comforting to think that.

BTW, the novel is no literary masterpiece, but a very interesting idea, from what I remember of it.