^^ interesting device, this repetitive negation of what “we did NOT do.” A story is about what characters DO, this lists what they DO NOT do.
Who are these people crossing out days on calendars, counting glasses of tea, if not “us?” Our future selves? Our neighbors?
What are “we” doing instead? Living with “certainty and contentment and pleasure in life” and not worrying about the passage of time?
Looking back on contentment of childhood.