Dreams With Sharp Teeth

Week of 1/27
**Draw a picture for what you just read.
Pages Read: 833-878    (Short Stories: : "Django" and "Count The Clock That Tells The Time")

"Count The Clock That Tells The Time" is a story about wasting time, or rather, wasted time and where it goes. The main character, Ian Ross, has been a time waster for 35 years of his life. He was 37 years old when the story stars. He did the same things everyday, and he lived, but he had never really lived in the way we're meant to. One day, he randomly thought, "Where does the time go?". From there, he realized he had wasted his whole life doing nothing and not living, so he decided to carry out one of his dreams: to live in Scotland and to live there. He wanted Scotland to be the place he actually did something. He spends two years in Scotland when the story begins with him once again asking, "Where does the time go?". As he sits on a hill looking at a lake, he realizes he had wasted his time again. Before he has time to do anything, the world around him begins to vanish. There is no more light, because the sun has gone. The ground beneath him vanished, too, but he didn't fall.

Soon, he's surrounded by nothing. He's left all alone standing in a world of darkness until he's approached by an old woman. She tells him this is a place filled with people all looking for a way out, and that he ought to keep walking so he may find the exit himself. Taking the advice, he walks and finds a man who can explain his theory as to where they are and why. Basically, he thought that unused time is not wasted in places where nothing ever happens. It doesn't just stay there, it goes to their little dark world. The guy said wasted time could be measured in units called 'chronons', which he made up for his theory. All those chronons sort of built up around a person that was wasting time, until so many had built up that the universe pulled the person into the dark world because the universe would recycle that wasted time. As he continues his walk, he meets a woman named Catherine. They decide to walk together and look for an exit, but they soon fall in love along the way. The new couple begins to set goals. They would set a goal to walk this amount of distance in a day, or they would play a some sort of game. They were enjoying their moments together and they were no longer wasting their time walking, as they was no exit. Since they were no longer 'wasted time', they could no longer be kept in the world for wasted time. They had to go. Over time, they begin to notice the other fading, bit by bit, everyday. One day, they fade completely. I drew my picture based on their last time together, where "they touched, there in that vast limbo of wasted time, for the last time," . For that, I drew two hands reaching towards each other, as if for one last touch or to hold on. Of course, I drew the background behind the hands as a dark place to match the story's description.