Imagine, if you will, time as a river. In some places it flows faster, in others it simply meanders along. Here and there are places where a bit of the river becomes isolated from the stream, wshed up on the bank as it were, sometimes becoming lost, other times being reabsorbed by a passing swell. It also contains little swirls, eddies that circle back upon themselves. And occasionally, larger ones. My name is Thomas Bowen, and this is the best explanation that I can come up with for how I found myself in 1814.