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Tuesday, May 13, 2014

A tiny Clara Dear in the Headlights

Tiny note on Clara’s talk with her mom. I just realized I wrote 'tiny' when I started writing, now that I am done and adding this line, it turns out 'tiny' for me is 'only' three pages. Good to know.


I think this has been the most important Clarina episode to date. By a mile. I’m not going to dissect every emotion and sentence in detail this time, so this is not my usual huge elaborate and detailed scene analysis, I'm hoping to get to that as well, but first I want to focus on something else.

Many people are saying Clara has been leading Marina on. I don’t think she has. I do think she is underestimating what Marina has gone through, but I’ll get back to later. First things first, let me quote a few things that Clara told her mom tonight.

‘It’s difficult to Cadu, to Marina it isn’t.’
‘Marina has never asked me to leave my husband. Abandon my son. She loves him.'

Right before that, Chica asked Clara if this maybe could have happened because she and Cadu were in a crisis, then that girl showed up, helped her, sheltered her, showed her a different path.


Clara is trying to show her mother that Marina is not taking advantage of a situation. She’s not Clara’s escape from a crisis at home. Marina isn’t trying to steal her away from her husband. She’s not Clara’s escape, she’s Clara’s love. She emphasizes she never asked her to leave him. She wants her mom to see she's not being pressured, this is all her. These are her feelings, she’s not being played or manipulated into making a decision hastily that she might regret later.

By saying what she said she's just making sure her mom doesn't see Marina as a homewrecker.

Some more quotes:

‘Nothing has happened… until now, nothing.’
‘I can’t tell you, I’ve never had a homosexual experience. I don’t know.’
‘No, never, not with her or any other woman, ever.’
‘I love both. I am divided by two people I love. I feel for both the same desire. But I’ve never had… I’ve never lived the other side of my sexuality. So for now, I love both.’
‘I can’t imagine that to have one I need to lose the other.’

Leading Marina on would mean she’s intending to never ever leave Cadu or lie about it to Marina and happily taste both sides of the coin. I don’t believe this for a second. While I think it's time to make a move, she's aware she can’t stay with the two of them at once, I don’t think Clara has any intentions to. She said it herself, it’s difficult to Cadu, she’s aware of this. She even told him there’s a problem. She knows Cadu wouldn’t want to share and she’s not going to live a secret double life. Clara knows she can’t be with both. She knows she has to make a decision at one point and I know she knows it, because of what she said.

'For now.'

It’s so important that I’m going to repeat it a few times. For now. For now. For now. She said 'for now' a bunch of times to her mom, in various ways. She is aware of the fact that UNTIL she has an experience with Marina, she won’t know. She knows what it’s like with one, she doesn’t know what it’s like with the other, so the minute she does sleep with Marina, she’ll have something to compare. As long as she has nothing to compare to what she knows, she can’t make a decision. So for now, she loves both equally.


Clara is fully aware of what she needs to do to find out who she loves more. She hasn’t had any experience with a woman, ever, so for now, she simply can’t choose, she doesn't know, she’s divided. She knows she will choose once she slept with Marina. She’s working up to the point where she is ready to do that. Ready to cheat on Cadu. She’s getting close. So it's not that she doesn't know what to do, she just doesn't know if she's ready to do it.

Like I said above, while I do think Clara has been underestimating the pain Marina has been through, the thing that has been mostly hurting Marina is that she’s not been having her, the uncertainty she had before. Marina has a whole lot less uncertainty now cause she has confirmation that Clara loves her. They are totally doing the couply thing, they are talking about feelings, they are even discussing homosexuality, which is kind of a big deal. To a certain extent, they are in ‘a kind of relationship’. Marina has Clara now, in a way. Even if she has only half of her for now, the thing that was killing her before, was not having her at all and not knowing what the situation was. This might not be the ideal situation, but it’s a lot better for Marina than it was a week or so ago. However, this can’t go on forever. Clara knows this. She fears it even. She said it herself, since she loves both, choosing one or the other, means losing the other one. It's not a decision she's eager to get to, it'll be painful, so she's been putting it off.


Another thing why she's not speeding towards a decision, is Marina hasn't given her reason to, in a way. She did say she didn’t believe in exclusivity. She never said they’d live together. Marina has never really told her what her expectations were. And while I think Marina totally wants to live with Clara and build a happy home together and she will totally be monogamous, she never truly made this clear to Clara. I think it’s a good idea if Clara and Marina sat down together to actually discuss the future, what they expect of it, of each other. While they have talked around it, they never really talked about it, if you know what I mean. Perhaps a bit too soon to discuss permanent future plans, after all they haven’t even kissed or slept together yet, so how about they get that over with first. But hey, we all know they are going to, it’s in the air, so I’ll be patient.

Anyway, it’ll be Clara’s own decision when she leaves her husband. I think both Clara and Marina know that while they may be having an affair for a while, Clara won’t be able to live with herself if that goes on for a long time. She’ll choose. She’ll leave him. Which brings us back to choosing one means losing the other.


That’s why she’s stalling. She cares about both, she’s scared because once she chooses one, she’ll lose the other, which will hurt. I think Clara is taking for granted the time she’s been given. Yes, she was in a really difficult situation and I think she made the right choice by staying with Cadu while he got sick. Abandoning him would have been heartless (no pun intended). If she had made the decision before he got sick, it's different. But she didn't, she ended up in this situation, she was in it now and she chose to dedicate all her time to her family cause they needed her. Now she's past that. She has time to breathe again, it's time to face the music, but that means losing someone and since that's not a fun thing to look forward to, I think she's subconsciously stalling for time, postponing the decision. She’s putting it off and she needs to get her ass moving already. She needs a push in the right direction and realize that she has to choose. To make a decision, she has to sleep with Marina. She has to cheat on Cadu. Clara needs to accept that she can't keep postponing, that it's time to do it.

Moving on to other things, because something huge happened tonight and while it may seem totally obvious, I’m going to make sure I mention it so that everybody can fully understand the significance of it.

Clara came out to her mother!


This is MAJOR STUFF! Coming out to a parent is huge. It’s scary to come out in the beginning to anyone, but your parents, for most people, that’s the scariest thing. I know for me, it was. I told my best friend first, took me two more years to tell my brother so he could be ‘on my side’ when it was time to tell my parents. I wanted him to know about it first, a couple of months at least before they did. Anyway, not going to discuss my coming out in detail, but just to make a point, coming out to a parent, is a huge deal.

You deal with their expectations, disappointment, tolerance, maybe religion, prejudice, acceptance, you name it. They are your parents, your home base, your family. For some it’ll be easier, for some it’ll be hard, but I know for most people I know, coming out to the parents was the biggest thing. Once you tell them, a weight is lifted off of your shoulders, you don’t feel like you’re having to live a double life as much as before, at least your home base knows about it. It’s one of the biggest steps in the road to acceptance. Not just them accepting you, but you accepting yourself. With that in mind, let me say it again, just to make sure it’s clear.

Clara came out to her mother!


She finally came out of the parental closet. Ok, maybe she didn’t come out. She was thrown out, fell flat on her face, then like a dear in the headlights she faced her mother. But she’s out! This is huge. Clara’s been holding back. She’s been hiding herself. This is draining, frustrating. She’s exhausted. She was longing for people to talk to about this, she talked to Helena, to Juliana, to Luiza even, she was screaming to make sense of this, to find out what this was. Once she found out what it was she was dealing with, she came onto the path to acceptance. She’s been on that path for a good while now and I think the end is in sight, but she’s not there yet and she has to follow it all the way, before she can accept that she has no other choice but to sleep with Marina to reach the happy end (pun intended).

Coming out to her mother was a huge step on that road to acceptance. It was a tough talk, difficult for both, but it ended well. Admitting for the first time that she loved Marina to anyone is huge as well. She knew it in her heart, she said it in different words, between the lines, but she said it. Don't underestimate how much more real it gets once you hear the words come out of your own mouth out loud. Then imagine saying that to your own mother. Right after you fell out of the closet. Doesn't get much more real than that. It was huge for Clara. You could see a huge major weight being lifted off of her shoulders by the end of that conversation. It was Awesome.


So this concludes my 'tiny' note on Clara's talk with her mom. Awesome episode, major stuff going on, I'm hoping to get into it more because there's a lot more to be said about it. Let's see what happens. Hope you enjoyed, I appreciate a comment, don't forget to share!

Beijos!





















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9 comments:

  1. Thank you so SO much for your comments, I really look forward to them.
    Where do you get your translations?

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    Replies
    1. Thanks! Glad you like them :)
      I get them from the zetaboards, Marina Clara thread, bunch of girls watch the episode live and post translations after the network posts the video's on the site.

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    2. I completely agree with you with respect to Clara being the lead protagonist of this love story. Course, Marina could turn
      -many- a straight girl gay with those 'to die for' eyes of hers. Just to play devil's advocate for a moment, I must say that Marina knew what she was getting into when she pursued this married woman. Make no mistake about it, her success with Clara has been remarkable. I definitely wish her character would pull back on the reigns a bit, the constant longing gig is getting a bit tedious. But again, it's Marina, so, it's still fabulous and beautiful.
      As an aside, I think it was a bit premature for Clara to tell her mother. Seems to me yet another ploy to draw out the main event. Who would tell their parents -before- they even kissed someone of the same sex? Just saying.

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  2. You're really making a great job trying to analize between lines of what they said and not. I just hope this story has the end it deserves. That´s what i hope, but i´m also a bit not too optimistic, coz i understand how the public pressure and hate opinions can change what was written at the begining.

    I found this story by chance, but i got so into it, that sometimes i feel it like mine. I guess this is specially thanks to the wonderful way that Giovanna and Tainá play their roles.

    Greetings from Colombia and keep doing what you´re doing.

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  3. Well, another Colombian here admiring your awesome job!
    I check every single day ur blog, I really enjoy every post u share with us. I use to read it and watch the video at same time; I always gets the scene better. Im wondering if u are a psychologist or something because noone can analyse this situation in the way u do. Im a big fan!
    Please, keep doing it, we need it!
    Hugs and kisses!

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  4. greqt job & thanks for shareing ur analize .

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  5. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  6. This scene was so important. This helps her to be more open about her sexuality, as we shall see on the next weeks. Thanks for dissections, Colette.

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  7. P.S. I can't wait for the next post. :P

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