“Experience counts for something. I count with my fingers. I could count on you, but you’ve only got one finger for me (the middle one).”

“I have so many friends I couldn’t even count them on one hand—not even if I had six fingers. Now, if I had seven fingers, I could count on them, but I still wouldn’t be able to count on my friends.”

“I’d rather count to one billion, than waste my time thinking I could count on you.”

“Are you an atheist?""Oh no, I honor all the gods.""And how many belong to that all?""Countless. And one.""How meaningless!""'Oliness, let me hear you count to one.""One.""Point at that one."Brownpony stirred restlessly. Finally he tapped his index finger against his temple.Wooshin laughed quietly. "Wrong. You had to think about it too long. And you didn't count to one. You counted from one and stopped. The one is countless.”

“Dipping my sticky glove into the bowl, I grabbed a handful of fingers. That’s five, if you’re counting.”

“I kept the fingers of my left hand crossed all the time, while on my right-hand fingers I counted anything at all—steps to the refrigerator, seconds on the clock, words in a sentence—to keep my head occupied. The counting felt like something to hang on to, as if finding the right numbers might somehow crack the code on whatever system ran the slippery universe we were moving through.”