One Week To Oprah

One week to a weekend with Oprah celebrating the 10th anniversary of her magazine O, The Oprah Magazine. I am getting so excited.

I plan on leaving Thursday after work to catch my flight. One of the Doe Sisters decided to join me late in the game and she's equally excited.

Oprah here I come!

Word of the Day

I love words. I love leaning new words. I love opening a musty old dictionary to any page and let my eyes scroll over the columns, from right to left, my specialty. Two years ago, I came upon the word "Pollyanna" and fell in love with it, probably how it rolled over my lips, not necessarily what it meant. Well, kinda what it meant but more how it sounded.

Today, my word of the day is strife, yesterday it was kerfuffle. Kerfuffle is a cute and polite way I think of saying there is some kind of row or disagreement going on. Strife follows in the same line or definition as kerfuffle. Go figure today is a full moon and all the tension leading up to this showing of the moon should put to rest the explosive energy lurking around.

Tomorrow's word of the day will to me and it will be on a lighter and more entertaining note.

Chances

What are the chances I will have lunch with Warren Buffet, Oprah, Sitting Bull (impossible he's dead) and Elizabeth Gilbert?

Slim, 50/50 or absolutely possible.

I vote for absolutely possible. You see, we will all converge in one city in a couple of weeks. Except Sitting Bull who passed in 1890. Everything is possible that's what makes life interesting.

No Spokesperson Here

Since posting the Top Three Cults in the U.S. last week, the feedback is mostly positive and helpful with one angry comment. I am no spokesperson for Anti Cults, just a blogger who writes about daily things that impact my life.

Cults are real and very much part of the terrain in some peoples life. I wish everybody the best and hope that their lives are full of love. What I cannot do is take the cult out of people. They are the only ones who can do that. Some don't even believe they are in a cult, so there!

But I can blog what's on my mind.

The Impact of Cults

I am no expert on cults but I do have first hand experience on the ill effects of them. One of my Doe Sisters is a mother to four children brought up in a cult. I am proud of her for the resiliency in her spirit.

She mothers from a distant to now all adult children raised in a cult. Each day she makes her way through the grit and grime of the debris of the cult. Some day her children reach out to her and allow her to be a good mom. Other days they admonish her and her non-cult ways.

But she preserves and triumphs like no other human being I met. She loves her children like all moms do, unconditionally.

So, Cults. Ugh. What else I can say. Maybe do not answer the door when they come a knocking. Have a terrific day.

The Top Three Cults in the U.S.

Top Three Cults in U.S.

1. Church of Jesus Christ Latter Day Saints - Mormonism
2. The Watchtower Bible and Tract Society - Jehovah's Witness
3. Church of Scientology

Restlessness is really avoidance

I lay down 10 times today beginning at 7:00 am this morning thinking a short siesta would cure this internal restlessness camouflaged as fatigue. Really it's avoidance, of what? That I am still trying to figure out.

But I am avoiding something. It took me a good ten minutes to log onto my blog and every possible distraction to get to this point. Writing is one of my releases, as well as, my vice in life. I may not be a Hemingway or an Austen but I am who I am. A writer. An introvert who gets out in the world through a small key hole slot of my imagination or opinion. Did I mention about another bad habit of procrastination that I love dearly too. Actually restlessness and procrastination go hand in hand in my book.

Anyway, I am here releasing some of my bad habits. I am afraid of failing so I don't try or don't follow through in many areas of my life. This drives hot husband crazy. At times me too. But I am like most women in the early 40's realizing things about myself.

With my restlessness comes the forms of distractions like throwing an impromptu dinner party and puttering about. Thank God it's the weekend and I am not going to be late for work. enjoy your day.

Happy Monday

Mondays are fabulous only if you embrace them. My Monday is off to a great start and I love it. It began with my boss giving me the day off, then rambling some stuff about gratitude on Facebook and now just relaxing after a bath.

What to do on a day off? Errands, a pedicure for sure and some shopping. Definitely, wash the care and get some spring air in my house.

I am blessed with good fortune you think? Everybody have a wonderful day.

Cults

Cults prey on the weak and emotionally distraught, particularly women. Most cults in some way cut off your connection to family, friends and community. In all cases, they do some form of brainwashing on the subject. If you Google cults in America you get 1.3 million direct hits. I have done this before.

But what hurts the most is the pain left on a parent(s). I witnessed that yesterday at a baby shower my Doe hosted for her daughter. Lets call her Bambi. Bambi always lead a strange life. She reminds her mom every chance she gets how she abandoned her and her siblings after the divorce. Not quite the case. But lets go with it. You see she was brought up in a cult. The one that does not celebrate holidays like Christmas and goes door to door selling a magazine for the towering price of 25 cents.

It's been a hard road for my sister but a well worth road. She is now 16 or 17 years sober and proud of it. She is now remarried and works. She is independent and smart as a whip. She came out of it a in one piece. I continuously remind her of my admiration of her courage and perseverance. Her eldest daughter remained in the cult.

Initially, I could not blame the kid, that's all she knew. She was kept from her mom after the divorce and indoctrinated into a cult that flourishes in shunning out family. Today, she's married with twins on the way, a young mother and educated. But her "cultness" comes to the surface at all the wrong times, like her baby shower. It was the innocence I remember in her that prevented me from blaming her for bad behavior in the past but not now. She is out right rude and disrespectful of her non-cult family. And in some way takes pride in it.

But the pain it causes my sister is not so nice. What is one to do? My Doe Sister is grateful to be part of her life and now her grandchildren's life. It's just hard to watch someone you love get shit on by their own child. Ce la vie, life in a cult.

The Does

I once Facebooked fudge is like family. Lot of sweet people with a few nuts. And in most cases it's true. There is not one family I know that has it all together including mine. I have five Doe Sisters and we are scattered across the Northeast but it's like we live on the same street.

Some days we are as close as sisters can be and other days when we are mortal enemies but in the end we love each other and are there for one another through good times and bad times. One of the Does is going through a particularly rough time of it, recently suffering a break up. Actually, she's been suffering the troughs of love for a long time. If I blinked and opened my eyes 20 years in the past, she would be at the same point in life. Love gone sour.

As her Doe Sister, I just want to hug her and tell her everything is going to be okay but it's not like that. This Doe does not do hugs well or advice or anything. She is head strong and will do what she will do. Not to anyone's delight and I am guessing including her own.

Sisterly love. Always. Forever.