I’m a short story lover. I can’t say I’m a true connoisseur because it’s not like I’ve read the entire canon of them, but I appreciate the hell out of them. Even the ones I don’t particularly like have merit. I’m also aware that short stories are not the most popular genre of literature on the planet. They’re not often “bestsellers.” You’re not running to buy so and so’s latest collection as you may have with Harry Potter or Patricia Cornwell or whoever your guilty or not-so-guilty pleasures are.

Nonetheless, short stories are my absolute favorite in the literature genre because they’re so hard to write and write well. And I love that they can take you on these incredible micro-journeys. It’s a bit like falling into Alice’s hole, having a crazy experience, and popping back up into the light of day as if no time had passed and nothing ever happened. But something did happen. It just didn’t happen in the time that it took you to read Crime & Punishment… more like the time it took you scroll through Instagram only to realize that you’re “All Caught Up.” So yeah, I like how short stories can pack a mighty punch in just a few pages.

Regardless of which side you fall on the Apple vs. Android debate, you have to admire the sleek simplicity of Apple’s design—both software and hardware. The fact that you could listen to any one of 10,000 songs with a single click wheel (old school iPod) is pretty amazing. The fact that my mom can use the latest iPhone without barely blinking an eye? Remarkable.

When I attempt to trace back my love affair with the short story, I want to say that it began with Isabel Allende. She’s a Chilean author living in California and although she’s known for her novels, the title of her short story collection is The Stories of Eva Luna. For years I was obsessed with the Spanish language and Latin American culture. That translated into a love affair with contemporary (post WWII and beyond) literature and I poured over the works of Gabriel García Márquez (Colombian), Mario Vargas Llosa (Peruvian) and Pablo Neruda (Chilean). I had a real thing for surrealism and a style that became known as magical realism. Think secret political subversion, the margins of society offering critique of elite society, fantastical elements bridging harsh reality with desired ones, a meeting of indigenous and colonial world views… Gosh there’s so much more I could say about this, but I’m going to shut up and move on.

I also jumped into American authors with Latin backgrounds such as Sandra Cisneros (Mexican), Julia Álvarez (Dominican) and Rudolfo Anya (Mexican). At some point in my late teens and early 20s, I fell madly in love with Argentina, which translated to Jorge Luís Borges and Julio Cortázar. And that, amigos, is where we’ll land today… with one of my favorite short stories by Julio Cortázar.

The man was a genius. There is a narrator point of view switch so subtle that it will knock your socks off. (If you want to read a bit about his life an and actual interview with him, this is pretty neat.) But before I over-sell this and blabber myself into a spoiler, just read. It’s super short. It’s available online in multiple places so I have no shame just plopping the text right here below (accessed from here). If you’re able to read it in the Spanish, do it here. It’s stunning.

Lastly, let me know if you have short stories you like. I’d love a recommendation or two. Comment below.

Take a deep breath and let yourself fall down the rabbit hole. I’ll see you on the other side. Happy Friday.

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 Continuity of Parks, by Julio Cortázar (published 1964)

He had begun to read the novel a few days before. He had put it aside because of some urgent business conferences, opened it again on his way back to the estate by train; he permitted himself a slowly growing interest in the plot, in the characterizations. That afternoon, after writing a letter giving his power of attorney and discussing a matter of joint ownership with the manager of his estate, he returned to the book in the tranquility of his study which looked out upon the park with its oaks. Sprawled in his favorite armchair, its back toward the door--even the possibility of an intrusion would have irritated him, had he thought of it--he let his left hand caress repeatedly the green velvet upholstery and set to reading the final chapters. He remembered effortlessly the names and his mental image of the characters; the novel spread its glamour over him almost at once. He tasted the almost perverse pleasure of disengaging himself line by line from the things around him, and at the same time feeling his head rest comfortably on the green velvet of the chair with its high back, sensing that the cigarettes rested within reach of his hand, that beyond the great windows the air of afternoon danced under the oak trees in the park. Word by word, absorbed by the sordid dilemma of the hero and heroine, allowing the images to arrange themselves and take on color and movement, he was witness to the final encounter in the mountain cabin. The woman arrived first, apprehensive; now the lover came in, his face cut by the backlash of a branch. Admirably, she stanched the blood with her kisses, but he rebuffed her caresses, he had not come to perform again the ceremonies of a secret passion, protected by a world of dry leaves and furtive paths through the forest. The dagger warmed itself against his chest, and underneath liberty pounded, hidden close. A lustful, panting dialogue raced down the pages like a rivulet of snakes, and one felt it had all been decided from eternity. Even to those caresses which writhed about the lover's body, as though wishing to keep him there, to dissuade him from it; they sketched abominably the shape of that other body it was necessary to destroy. Nothing had been forgotten: alibis, unforeseen hazards, possible mistakes. From this hour on, each instant had its use minutely assigned. The cold-blooded, twice-gone-over reexamination of the details was barely broken off so that a hand could caress a cheek. It was beginning to get dark.

Not looking at each other now, rigidly fixed upon the task which awaited them, they separated at the cabin door. She was to follow the trail that led north. On the path leading in the opposite direction, he turned for a moment to watch her running, her hair loosened and flying. He ran in turn, crouching among the trees and hedges until, in the yellowish fog of dusk, he could distinguish the avenue of trees which led up to the house. The dogs were not supposed to bark, and they did not bark. The estate manager would not be there at this hour, and he was not there. He went up the three porch steps and entered. The woman's words reached him over a thudding of blood in his ears: first a blue chamber, then a hall, then a carpeted stairway. At the top, two doors. No one in the first room, no one in the second. The door of the salon, and then, the knife in his hand, the light from the great windows, the high back of an armchair covered in green velvet, the head of the man in the chair reading a novel.