Short Takes

I opened Short Takes to a random page to begin this assignment and, by some chance, ended up with Lawrence Millman's "Bookless in Biak." Another random page, this time closer to the beginning of the  book, and Amy Tan's "Confessions" came into my life. Choosing which to respond to took exponentially longer than reading either of the two/three page essays; I had before me a light, funny essay about the search for a book to have if not to read and a dark, moving essay about parents and memory and the duality of one's will to live when faced with the possibility of dying. After conversations I'd had with a friend over the past few days I could relate better to the Tan essay, but I'd had enough of suicide and sadness for a while, so here is my reflection on being bookless.

Millman speaks of not necessarily reading books but rather the inherent security that comes of having books. Thus I collect books and read them once, occasionally three twenty times but mostly once and then leave them to sit on the shelf and collect dust but I do not need to read them to be glad that they are there if I ever do need them.

I'm not sure if I'm doing this assignment right, or if I'm trying to be faithful to a typo. Fifty words is not enough words to communicate anything of substance, save in poetry.