The book on the nightstand: The things we don’t do

Shortness is something that does not last long.
It looks like a sad thing. But not at all, at least not always.

So many beautiful things are short. A kiss. The Joy of a Yes. A Song. Sunrise and sunset. Eclipse and comet. A hug, a smile, a peony. One day so long awaited.

Less is more.

I admired who could say so much in a few words. The poets, of course, but also those that has the art of the tale in their blood.

Andrés Neuman with The things we don’t do is among these.

The book contains 25 stories in which there are no excess words.

The measure of collection is shortness.

The stories of The Things we don’t do “are quick flashes of light that open on the lives of strangers” not tied to each other with a red thread.

So the author writes of faithless loves (Happiness), of a strange couple (A line on the sand), of the symmetry of love that move away rather than connect (The perfect couple), of a paradoxically funny suicide (A suicide regurgitates), of a degenerate dialogue between Carabinieri and a driver (Evidence of innocence), of forgiveness finally granted to the lifelong enemies (After Elena) and so on.

My favorite one is the story that gives the title to the collection, The things we don’t do and we don’t even notice losing on the road.

Here’s the turning point. Neuman sees the good in their failed realization and tries to show it:

I like the travel guides that I browse with so much attention that I admire in you, with their monuments, streets and museums where we never foot, enchanted by a cafeteria.

The author tells the moment when things are about to take shape in our minds and they already give us joy to the idea of their realization.

I call it daydreaming. They are The things we don’t do.

Then there are things that last a short time, like summer, but that’s no reasons something missing.

Reading time
25 summer evenings

Ph. Sara Cartelli
© The Eat Culture