Claudia Catalina

Angst is easy. Doing anything, really doing anything, is harder. Nihilism offers nothing, and yes, I do realize that is its point. This is a time for sharp edges. This is a time for ruthlessness. This is a time for taking sides. You cannot be neutral when you are under threat. Do you think you are not under threat? Whose safety have you mortgaged for your own?

I can’t remember the last time I saw an American movie where an American woman washed off blood in a shower and the blood wasn’t hers.

You are allowed to be alive. You are allowed to be somebody different. You are allowed to not say goodbye to anybody or explain a single thing to anyone, ever.

They say a good love is one that sits you down, gives you a drink of water, and pats you on top of the head. But I say a good love is one that casts you into the wind, sets you ablaze, makes you burn through the skies and ignite the night like a phoenix; the kind that cuts you loose like a wildfire and you can’t stop running simply because you keep on burning everything that you touch! I say that’s a good love; one that burns and flies, and you run with it!

“You may not agree with a woman, but to criticize her appearance — as opposed to her ideas or actions — isn’t doing anyone any favors, least of all you. Insulting a woman’s looks when they have nothing to do with the issue at hand implies a lack of comprehension on your part, an inability to engage in high-level thinking. You may think she’s ugly, but everyone else thinks you’re an idiot.”

I’m in love with you. Yeah, it’s that bad. You’re so beautiful to me. Shut up, let me tell you, let me. Every time I look at your face, or even remember it, it wrecks me. And the way you are with me; you’re just fun and you shit all over me and you make fun of me and you’re real. I don’t have enough time in any day to think about you enough. I feel like I’m gonna live a thousand years cause that’s how long it’s gonna take me to have ONE thought about you which is that I’m crazy about you. I don’t wanna be with anybody else. I don’t. I really don’t. I don’t think about women anymore. I think about you. I had a dream the other night that you and I were on a train. We were on this train and you were holding my hand. That’s the whole dream: you were holding my hand and I felt you holding my hand. I woke up and I couldn’t believe it wasn’t real. I’m sick in love with you. It’s like a condition; it’s like polio. I feel like I’m gonna die if I can’t be with you and I can’t be with you so, I’m gonna die and I don’t care cause I was brought into existence to know you, and that’s enough…

Everything I’ve ever let go of, had claw marks on it.

You have something amazing right here and the fact that you are not happy about it does not mean you should abandon it. Rather, it means you have to truly commit to it — on its terms. I suspect that you are expecting the feeling of belong to come, and then, once you feel you belong, you will decide to stay. But that’s backwards. You won’t belong until you’ve decided to stay. Begin truly living in this place and the feeling of belonging will follow, because it will be a fact. Once you’ve committed to staying, then you will belong, and the feeling of belonging, a feeling you desire to have, will arise because you actually belong.