This week at the Carrot Ranch, Charli Mills challenged writers to In 99 words (no more, no less), write a story about lost time. You can write a realistic scenario or something speculative. How does lost time impact the character of your story? Bonus points if you include a 1982 brown rubber watch Go where the prompt leads!
Time is something there never seems to be enough of, and it’s like many other things — if you don’t use it, you lose it.
One common saying is that time is wasted on the young. I don’t think it’s wasted, but I think to young people it seems infinite. It did to me anyway. I thought there was time enough for everything I wanted to achieve. I thought that, as this song from my youth said, time was on my side.
As I got older, I realised that time wasn’t infinite and that in fact, it was not only precious, it was also slipping away.
While we may not entirely be able to make up for lost time, we can always make the most of our present time.
One of my favourite quotes about time, sometimes but not correctly attributed to Einstein, is that its only purpose is to stop everything happening at once. I think this is true of events in both the past and the future. If we are unable to associate them with a date or a context, they may as well have happened or happen at the same time.
If the only time we have is now, we must enjoy it and make the best use of it we can until our time is up and there are no more ‘present’ moments.
Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift, that’s why it’s called the present.
Every day we open that gift with anticipation and use its joys to create our tomorrows.
I guess I don’t need to state the obvious, that I’ve reached that stage of life where there’s more time in the past than the future. However, for as long as I have the present, I’ll be doing my best to make the most of it.
Here’s my response to Charli’s challenge. I hope you enjoy it.
Out of Time
“Time’s up!”
“Not yet! I’m not finished.”
Mallory stared at the page, blank except for some scribbles and a few false starts. Others smiled as they handed in their papers, earning accolades and rewards for tasks successfully completed.
“Please, just a little more time?”
“You’ve already had more than most.”
“I can do it. Promise.”
The timekeeper tapped the watch. “Five more. That’s all.”
Mallory worked frantically until the timekeeper declared, “You’re out of time.”
Mallory smiled, “It’s never too late to begin.”
The timekeeper agreed. “But you could have achieved much more had you not wasted time earlier.”
Thank you for reading. I appreciate your feedback. Please share your thoughts.
Norah Colvin 
I appreciate your feedback. Please share your thoughts.