The Moth Presents Quotes

“I try asking myself, Okay, if everything fell apart, if everything went to hell the worst way possible, would I think to myself, I am so glad I did not let myself experience joy or enthusiasm in the good moments because it really protected me from the future?

No. Life doesn't work like that. Nothing protects you.

So I practice enjoying.”
― Catherine Burns, The Moth Presents: Occasional Magic: True Stories About Defying the Impossible

“I left the stage gratified, hot-faced, exorcised, thrilled, thinking, I would do this again.”
― Catherine Burns, The Moth Presents: Occasional Magic: True Stories About Defying the Impossible

“And I thought that just as species diversity is essential to keep the planet functional, so there’s a need for a diversity of love to sustain the ecosphere of kindness, and that anyone who rejected any bit of the love in the world was acting from a position of folly.”
― Catherine Burns, The Moth Presents: Occasional Magic: True Stories About Defying the Impossible

“drawn to the Celtic idea of thin places—“thin places,” “thin times”—the idea that there are places we can experience where the veil between heaven and earth is worn thin, where the temporal and the transcendent seem to touch.”
― Catherine Burns, The Moth Presents: Occasional Magic: True Stories About Defying the Impossible

“Then the police come. My mom is apprehensive of the police being there, because it’s no secret that black and brown people are not trusting of the police. They make us feel anxious, like we have something to prove. My mom doesn’t want to bring that energy into our apartment. She doesn’t want that energy to affect Peta, most importantly. She doesn’t want that thought process and that anxiousness to overwork him. So she is going back and forth with the police and bickering with them. But eventually she gives up when they threaten to arrest her for not allowing them on her property. And so eight or nine police officers crowd into our tiny apartment. They are standing over me, watching me apply pressure to Peta, not providing any assistance. (It’s Chicago; they could have been doing something way more important.)”
― Catherine Burns, The Moth Presents: Occasional Magic: True Stories About Defying the Impossible

“Occasional magic refers to those moments of beauty, wonder, and clarity, often stumbled upon, where we suddenly see a piece of truth about our life..... the moments when you become "you.”
― Catherine Burns, The Moth Presents: Occasional Magic: True Stories About Defying the Impossible