A Letter On Starting Over

[bigletter]The following letter, I wrote a few months ago on a train, while on my way to the French Alps, where I would be spending New Year’s Eve with my childhood best friend. We rented out a chalet and we would welcome 2019 in Saint Gervais-Les-Bans. It was my first Christmas and New Year’s Eve since I had left Miami to move to London. A new stage of my life and career was upon me, and I was ready:[/bigletter]

Often times life takes unexpected turns, but other times we, ourselves take life and turn it around.

In my short life, I’ve come to realize that not everyone has the character and the balls to make those choices for themselves; those are the types of people that just go with the flow, you know? The ones who take life as it comes, but who never define exactly what they want and go out to chase it no matter how many times it may mean that they have to start over.

I’m not one of those people. I’m the type that jumps off the fucking cliff. I get on that plane. I’m the type that is willing to start over as many times as possible as long as it means that I’m not settling for what life gives me, but rather for what opportunities I create for myself using solely what life gives me.

You see…life comes for us all as a white canvas. No matter what condition you’re born in, what social class you’re in, who raised you, or where you grew up…you get that white canvas. You choose what to do with it. Some get all the tools from mom and dad: the paintbrush, the paint, the oil to delude, the mixer, the professor, even mom and dad sit beside some and teach them the proper ways to paint…while some only get a few things. Some get none other than the canvas, and it’s a shitty one.

I’m one of those people that got the paintbrush, the paint and the instruments, yet no professors. My parents didn’t have the tools nor did they know the people that they could pay to teach me to paint my perfect painting, or better yet, the ideal painting of my life according to them. I had to teach myself, that every stroke meant one more step in the direction of what I wanted to create, and every mistake had to be learned from, and with some patience and creativity, it could sometimes be fixed. Some of my biggest mistakes ended up being the most interesting parts of my painting, however, the most valuable tool I am learning now is that if the painting doesn’t result in the way you wanted it to, or if it doesn’t fully satisfy you, you can paint the whole thing white and start over. You can start again. Under that white paint is still the story of your strokes, your mistakes, the meaning behind every time your brush touched that canvas, however, the white paint, means that you get about 1000 new strokes; 1000 new shots; 1000 new opportunities.

In February of this year, I came to London for what was supposed to be a short period that I’d dedicate to my studies of Fashion Journalism…you know (if you know me) that had been my passion and the main focus for the past five years of my life. However, when the plane touched the ground and I got off, I felt a sense of belonging I hadn’t felt in a really long time. I arrived on the coldest week of the year, but I felt warm inside and full of excitement and anticipation. One experience led to the next, and I decided I wouldn’t go back home to Miami just yet. The 3 weeks turned into 6, and 6 weeks turned into 6 months, and I painted over my masterpiece of a life I had created for myself in Miami: a TV host covering some of the most coveted events of the year and interviewing some of the most interesting figures on television.

Painting over that was so scary. But being in London I realized I wanted more. I want to speak to real people, with real stories who many times don’t have a voice.  The people who ONLY have the canvas and the paintbrush, but who work really hard every day to be able to afford a little bit of paint to create their masterpiece; The people who don’t have a shot at a masterpiece because they don’t believe in themselves, they’ve been told they’re not enough, their strokes are painted over and covered by someone else, or maybe they don’t have a choice at which color to paint with or which brush to use; those are the people I want to talk to. The ones who make it work regardless of the circumstances of their canvas and the tools they somehow, someway get a hold of. I also wanted to tell the stories of the people I had met. Of the people that changed my life, that made me smile, that made me dance, or that taught me how to love or how to make the best of a rainy day. The people that sometimes treated me like a wet mop on the floor, but that reminded me that I was much more than what I was living with them and that I still had moments to learn from and to continue humbling myself for.

As I sit on this train, I realize that this is my white canvas, my reset, my do-over. So allow me to reintroduce myself, my name is Caterina, but I always introduce myself as Cata. I am a journalist who left her dream job as a TV host in Miami, to run away to London and travel the world while documenting every piece, every story, and every moment that touches her heart– as long as the data wants to collaborate the stories will always be there and my questions will always be the difficult ones.

“We travel, some of us forever, to seek other states, other lives, other souls.” – Anais Nin.

Watch my experience in Saint Gervais through my instagram highlight here

I adore capturing every highlight of my travels and sharing them in hopes of helping a curious traveler with a bit of insight. If you want to see more visit and follow my hashtags #CBtalksTraveling &  #CBgoestoFrance or #CBgoestoTheAlps to stay in tune with where I go next.

With love from London…