Using a time machine as an allegory for fixing your mistakes is a tried and true conceit - but what about a time machine as one for your perception of time? Rather than the time machine take you from place to place to fix things, it instead shows you through "chronodiegetic space" that your decisions would have always been that way even if you have the perfect information you so desired.

Carried forward, your time machine is how you can escape for a time, waffling through your 20s and the first part of your 30s and insulating yourself from the actual time passing outside; the time machine goes both ways.

How to Life Safely is ultimately two different books: a meta-metaphor of narrative through refusing to engage with the narrative... and a surprisingly standard litfic examination of a strained relationship with your father. It's easy to see which one I prefer.