Ruchika Nambiar - Story for Final Project - Chapter 1
The Adventures of Time & Circumstance
Chapter 1
Circumstance and the Potato Problem
Time and Circumstance sat atop their twisted tree stumps, playing their favorite game for no reason besides boredom. They were oblivious to the havoc they caused in the lives of unsuspecting humans. Between them was a depthless marble bowl and inside, swirled a never ending mass of events yet to take place.
"Which year do we visit?" asked Circumstance excitedly. Her voice shrill and her ringlets danced about her dimpled face. Circumstance was made up of a million threads – like nerves – interweaving to form her body. These were the uncountable, infinite strands of life – one for every circumstance of every moment and an infinite more for all the other undiscovered possibilities of every moment.
Time was many people seen as one – one for each second of each person's life. The opposite of how a drunk man would see many of one person, humans were taught to see all these different people as one for the sake of convenience. Like many different transparent images of a person blurring into one, splitting again when you look too closely, and coming back together once you've blinked.
These reckless children of the universe sat across from each other, like parallel mirrors, causing each other to multiply infinitely, each holding the image of the other within itself. They each held within them, all the parallel universes that existed in the world.
"Circumstance, why must you worry your pretty little head when the dice can make the decision for us?" he asked condescendingly. He held out his hand and a small dice slowly materialized in his palm. It was a curious little object. Curious because its faces were constantly changing. Each face had numbers changing between zero and nine, the numbers pausing just long enough to read.
"How many times, Circumstance?"
"Four!" she clapped her hands in delight.
And Time rolled the dice four times. The dice landed on 1. He rolled it again. It gave him an 8. And then a 4. And finally a 5. And with that, like moving chess pieces on a board, Time stood up and moved away, and another Time took his place. Time had looped back to the year 1845.
"Say, sister. Why is it that you enjoy A.D. so much?" Time asked.
"Oh come now, Time. It's a lot more fun when the humans believe they're getting smarter. When they believe they're recording their 'history' and 'progressing' and all those other funny words they use. I believe the later the year -- or rather the later they believe the year is -- the better."
"Well, I must admit their concept of 'history' is quite amusing."
"Quiet now brother, let us get back to our game. Pick a place." She rested her elbows on the edge of the bowl and waited for him to decide.
"Ireland?" he asked after a moment of thought. Circumstance wrinkled her nose in response.
"I don't like the Irish. They eat too many potatoes."
Time laughed. "And what problem have you with potatoes now, sister?"
"They're boring. And shapeless." Suddenly her eyes lit up. "Let's make the potatoes in Ireland disappear!" She looked back at him with sparkling, eager eyes. Time shook his head reproachfully.
"Now, now, Circumstance. You know the rules of The Bowl. You can't just make things disappear." Her face fell. She really wanted to make potatoes disappear. But she soon cheered up as a new idea struck her. Without wasting any more time, she reached out with one hand into the bowl. She quickly rummaged around in Mexico until she found what she was looking for. She picked up a glowing bead and looked at it with a wide grin on her face. It pulsed with a soft even rhythm between her fingers.
"And what might that be?" Time asked, staring curiously at the bead.
"You'll see," she responded, pulling out a strand from her little finger and stringing it through the bead. Placing the bead back in its place, she took the other end of the thread and stretched it all the way out to Ireland. She quickly strung it through the first potato bead she saw.
"Now watch it grow." The two children leaned over the bowl, watching with glee as the little bead flattened and then proceeded to expand, its bluish glow engulfing the whole of Ireland.
* * *
The proximate cause of famine was a potato disease commonly known as potato blight. How and when the blight Phytophthora infestans arrived in Europe is still uncertain. The origin of the fungus has been traced to Toluca Valley of Mexico, from whence it spread first to North America and then to Europe. The famine was a watershed in the history of Ireland. Its effects permanently changed the island's demographic, political and cultural landscape.
During the famine approximately 1 million people died and a million more emigrated from Ireland, causing the island's population to fall by between 20% and 25%. Although blight ravaged potato crops throughout Europe during the 1840s, the impact and human cost in Ireland – where one-third of the population was entirely dependent on the potato for food – was exacerbated by a host of political, social and economic factors which remain the subject of historical debate.
* * *
Circumstance yawned a few hours later. "I'm bored," she announced. "Too many bodies lying all around."
"One more before we call it a day?" Time asked. This was his favorite game and he loved watching how the little players ran around on their tiny feet. His favorites were the ones who tried to figure out life. It was even more fun when they thought they were succeeding at it. "Let's make it a quick one. No far-reaching consequences this time; I'm hungry and I want to go inside too."
"Oh alright alright. Pick a time and make it quick," she groaned.
Time stood up and quickly chose a year at random.
"What year is it?" asked Circumstance, her voice bored and sleepy. She slowly lifted her head to look into the bowl in front of her.
"Don't know," replied Time impatiently. "Late 17th century or so. Does it matter?"
"S'pose not," she replied and yawned again. "She peered into the bowl more closely. Her eyes finally focused on something.
"Time!" she wailed, annoyed. "There's nothing going on here! It's just a boy sitting under a tree."
"It'll make for a quick game, won't it?" he defended.
"Oh alright." She brightened up at the prospect of a quick prank. Bending down into the bowl, she blew at the tree under which the boy was sitting. The tree and its branches shook and apple fell out of the tree. It fell right on the boy's head with a low thud.
The children giggled in delight.
"Nice aim, sister." Time complimented her. They both stood up laughing and started walking towards their cottage.
"Told you there wouldn't be any far-reaching consequences on that one," Time boasted, as they skipped back home, hand in hand, for a slice of pie.
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