Despite the horror, we survivors were endowed with a will to survive. Or instinct. Or maybe it was faith.

A mind is a simulation that simulates itself.

Yes: I exist inside my body.I__ not carrying the sun and the moon in my pocket.I don__ want to conquer worlds because I slept badly,And I don__ want to eat the world for breakfast because I have a stomach.Indifferent?No: a son of the earth, who, if he jumps, it__ wrong,A moment in the air that__ not for us,And only happy when his feet hit the ground again,Pow! In reality where nothing__ missing!(6/20/1919)

I did not believe that a Cause which stood for a beautiful ideal, for anarchism, for release and freedom from convention and prejudice, should demand the denial of life and joy. I insisted that our Cause could not expect me to become a nun and that the movement would not be turned into a cloister. If it meant that, I did not want it.

I nod, because I do understand. I'm just not sure how to go about divorcing myself from the evil I've already accepted.

Huge difference between being happy at will, and chasing euphoric moments as an escape. One doesn't cost a dime, the other will tax your soul.