AT LAST: An Adaption of “All the Time”

               “All the Time” or “Time Enough at Last” is one of the episodes of an American television anthology series The Twilight Zone. This certain episode is centered on the life of Henry Bemis, who loves to read books but is prevented by people around him. One day, when he hid inside a vault to read, the ground shook very strongly and he lost his consciousness. When he awoke and went outside the vault, he only saw ruins and rubbles of the bank, of his house and of everything that stood there before. Because of what he felt as loneliness, he nearly committed suicide until he saw the ruined public library with all kinds of books scattered on the ground. It was heaven for him! For at last, he had all the time he needed to read. But when his glasses broke, not even a second can give him pleasure anymore.

          If I were to make an adaptation of the episode, I would write about a girl who loves to text all the time. Even when she is facing the other person she wants to talk to, she would still use her phone to communicate. Her parents and even some of her friends would keep telling her to stop her rude habits and change it. But she would insist that what she’s doing is not wrong since when she stops texting the unlimited text she has will go to waste. People should just understand her, it’s her life anyway. She continued doing such, ignoring the reprimands of the people around her, and kept defending herself. Not a single face-to-face interaction. Time passed, and the people she called friends were no more. Her family became cold and indifferent towards her. But then again, she ignored all these. She got a lot of other people to meet, connect and to text anyway! That’s the power of technology! Then one day her world crumbled. Her so-called text friends were gone as well. She could not get any text and replies from anyone any more. She might have the time and loads to waste; but what she doesn’t have are people she could text and who would also text her back. They had turned their backs from her.

         The adaptation I presented is somehow related to what is happening in the world today. We are too engrossed in communicating with other people even when they are near us using media devices. Instead of actually sparing an hour to personally talk to a friend to catch-up with him/her, we resort to use mediated communication that could not truly give that warmth and comfort we mostly get from face-to-face interactions. We may have new high-tech devices to connect with lots of people; but we may also be losing the real touch and feeling of being a human.