Look Down the Tunnel?

2 years ago, someone used the phrase, “you’ll blink, and then you’re 50” to me. I had heard versions of this phrase before, but this time the implications sank in. Hearing that phrase shattered the illusion of my infinite youth. I remember looking at old people with a kind of disbelief that they had ever been young. They’ve always been old, the same way I’ve always been young. I soon became terrified that time would pass me by at an accelerating rate. What cemented this fear was that I had already been feeling this effect. Classes were not as excruciatingly long as they were in middle school. Summer months that used to feel like forever were ending before I knew it. I had been recognizing the effect of time speeding up, but it felt like a choice I was allowing. Like, yes, I know time feels really fast right now, but that’s because I’m focusing on other things. Like many people, I’ve always been aware that time was “running out” but I wasn’t applying it to my reality. When it did hit me, I felt fear that my life, something I felt I owned, was being taken from me. As Gustavo Razzetti says in his article Why Accepting Death Will Make You Worry Less, “In our material world, life has become a possession too. And we cannot let go of it.”

To convey anxiety about time running out, I wrote a story where time is a tunnel that we all fall down. I use a cutout on each page that grows larger so the reader can experience seeing the bottom of the tunnel getting closer and closer. As I engaged with more people about my topic, I realized not everyone shared a time as I do. I included narrative options like a choose-you-own adventure book to allow the reader to choose what their relationship with the tunnel looks like. I decided to have all choices lead to the same ending because across the different perspectives, one similarity I heard were these moments of awareness of the inevitability of time passing that hit them in a new, discomforting light. But I didn’t want to end the book where the reader actually does hit the bottom of the tunnel, because then what? I found the ending through my own process of managing my time for this project. I was lying in bed, thinking, I don’t have any time left. And then I opened my eyes, looked around me, and said, “Franny. Time is right here next to me.” Yes, time passes, but it will always be next to you. Even when it leaves, in its place comes more time.