Quotes from Jessica Zafra

Being good does make a difference. You will not receive praise or payment for it, and other people will mistake your goodness for weakness, but it resonates among people you won't even meet.

Few things in life are certain, and one of them is that you can turn on the television at three in the morning and someone will be singing and dancing on the Indian channel. Proof of Nietzsche's theory of eternal recurrence.

I don't hurt other people intentionally. I'm not a bad person. I have a decent job. So I like to put on high heels and a little dress. Does that make me a monster? -Edgar Saturnino, 24 (Lamentations 5:23)

We have no control over fate and history, but we can control how we conduct ourselves in this life.

There are limits to self-improvement. Inevitably you hit the point where what you are is, well, what you are, and all the teach-yourself videos and easy-to-use equipment on those creatinous home TV shopping things can no longer ward off you confrontation with your self.

What exactly did we learn in kindergarten? Nothing we wouldn't have learned if we;d stayed home. Okay, we learned that sometimes, by the time you get to the bathroom, it's too late.

Food is the all-purpose comforter, the giver of warmth, the source of the artificial yet deeply appreciated sugar high.

it may rain or it may shine, probably at the same time. (Lamentations 5:23)

Humans have terrible passions that can go either way: create or destroy, it all depends on where they emerge. Art is not a tranquil occupation. What is peaceful about wrestling with nothingness? If the process isn't brutal, it's just decor. Your choice: violence towards others, or violence to yourself?

It's not words that fail, it's the people who wield them. We have no power over life and death, we are subject to pain and disease and misery, but we command words. When you think about it, words are all we really have.

Freedom doesn't give you the license to do whatever the hell you want. It doesn't give you the license to, excuse my language, piss on other people's freedom.

Food is the best substitute for everything, because it does not put up any resistance, but surrenders instantly.

Why would you sacrifice today's freedom for a future that will always remain uncertain, no matter how carefully you plan for it?

These days when we speak of politics at all it is with indifference, anger, or "Please, could we talk about something that doesn't make us nauseous?" But there was a time when we could discuss government with hope, pride, and trust in our leaders, and that was when Corazon Aquino was president.

What I'm saying is, where have all the real people gone? Where are the recognizably-human beings? Of course, it's silly of me to look them on TV commercials, no one watches ads for their true-to-life portrayals. If the ads were full of real people, they wouldn't be able to sell anything. Which is the point of this rambling column. Real people just don't sell.

The guilty pleasure defense. In my view if it's guilty, it ain't pleasure.

He made writing look easy and critics hate that. They like evidence of a struggle, of creative agony, wringing the masterpiece out of one's guts. After all, most critics think of themselves as writers, or had attempted to become writers. This leads to the bizarre situation in which failed writers pass judgment on writers who actually write for a living.

We often reward mediocrity because it is comforting. If they can do it, anyone can do it.

The book identifies you as part of the tribe. On the opposite extreme, there are people who will walk up to you when you're reading a book because they think you're lonely.

The truth is, the more one knows about Art, the more one values Entertainment.

Tolkien tells us that we do not charge into battle because we know we will win. We do so regardless of odds and outcomes, because we have to.

My emotional range is limited. I can't do grief, but rage is my friend. For instance, I hate death by sickness. It is nothing like Homer, the Old Testament, and Tolkien led me to expect. It is not noble and awe-inspiring. No one delivers a final soliloquy. It is as abrupt and banal as the flicking of a switch.

This is not what death should be. Death, the reason for religion, the subject of great literature, the certainty we spend our lives warding off, the giant mystery that looms over everything we do, death should be spectacular, not pity-inducing, a bang and not a whimper. A huge ball of fire, a shower of sparks, a final charge into the ranks of your enemies, a terrific explosion, a backward dive into the fiery pit. Not. . .this.

The one thing that worries me is that with my mother gone, the voice in my head that tells me to be nice to others has been silenced forever. I fear for other people.