I don't quite remember when I fell in love with tea but I do remember the most special moments of me drinking tea. I was eighteen years old and I went to live with my biological mother for four months. I had just met her months earlier and it was awkward for both of us. She and her ex-husband lived a very quiet life in Boulder, Colorado. He was a professor at one of the universities and she was a housewife. After years of drug addiction and being in and out of jail, she deserved the break. I was homeless so she and her husband agreed to let me come live with them. Each evening my mother and I would find a spot in the living room with a cup of tea and a book.

Now, years later, I'm a self proclaimed tea expert. I start each day with a wonderful English Breakfast tea to get me going. As the day progresses, who knows what wonderful tea I will crown queen. But for sure, I have at least three cups of tea a day. And yes, when I can, I have tea everyday at about 3:00 P. M. I love to invite my friends over for tea and cupcakes and so far everyone thinks it’s a delightful experience. I am always in search of the best blend of tea. Yes, I’m a tea snob, I prefer loose tea but I do like some bags also. I have learned not to judge a book by it’s cover. Some bags can be quite nice. And yes again, any Diva knows, what you drink your tea out of is very important.

Tea for me is a way of life. It's wellness for the mind body and spirit. Here, I will explore every expect of tea possible, with a high concentration on wellness. I will review the best teas, the best places to have tea, the best ways to brew tea, the best tea accessories, what tea goes best with what foods, and the list goes on and on. I plan to share my passion for tea with you. And I've been told, nothing I do is ever boring so be prepared to go on this tea journey with me.





RLT Collection Tea Ball Frosted Clear Beads!

Mint Medley by The Persimmon Tree Tea Company

About This Tea:

Until recently I had never drank Peppermint Tea made with loose leaves. And Honestly, I will probably never go back. The freshness of loose Peppermint Tea cannot be denied. When I open the can of Mint Medley, From The Persimmon Tree Tea Company, I feel as if I stepped into a garden of peppermint leaves. It is a perfect blend of organic peppermint and spearmint leaves grown in the US.

Mint Medley has become a favorite and I find myself reaching for this tea tin almost everyday. It is great for on-going nausea. The health benefits and endless. It relieves muscle aches, headaches, migraines, stress. And now that it feels like someone is sitting on my chest and I have a mean cough, I'm sure it will help to relieve some of this congestion in my chest. Mint Medley has been in my tea cup more than any tea as of late. It has really helped with my winter cough, congestion related to this bout of pneumonia. You can read my full review on The Persimmon Tree Tea Company Mint Teas.


RLT Collection AIDS Awareness Tea Ball!




Welcome to my world of books! As an pre-teen books changed my world. I fell in love with the writers of the Harlem Renaissance period and the more I read the more I wanted to read. The fiction of this period was powerful and empowering all at the same time. It spoke to my own degradation and gave me hope for a better tomorrow. It gave me purpose for my own life and the courage to fight the good fight and never surrender.

I love to read! Inside a book I escape into someone else's life. There is something wonderful about turning to the next page of a wonderful story. Something intoxicating about the smell of the book and the story it brings to life. Reading brings me joy, and these days with my health in the balance, I find solace in my books.

I spent hours in my bedroom sequestered with the door closed reading the classics from the Harlem Renaissance, Hughes, Larsen, Hurston, Wright and Baldwin. Books became my escape and my salvation. The fiction of this period was powerful and empowering all at the same time. It gave me purpose for my own life and the courage to fight the good fight and never surrender.

Reading is the one thing that the pain of my life could never take away from me. It was the thing that helped to make it better. And even today, living with AIDS, books continue to be the safest place for me. It’s the one thing that belongs to me that AIDS cannot take away from me.The RLTReads book club will be books that I choose. It’s me sharing a part of me with you that has nothing to do with AIDS. It’s actually in spite of AIDS.

The RLTReads book club will be books that I choose. It’s me sharing a part of me with you that has nothing to do with AIDS. It’s actually in spite of AIDS. I have read hundreds of books from many different genres and I will pick the best of my reads over the years. I warn you, it will not be exclusively white or black, male or female, fiction or non fiction, it will be all of them.

I’m so excited and I’m grateful to everyone who wants to be a part of this venture. We already have 110 Book Club Members. You can email me @ RLTReads@raelewisthornton.com. The Twitter hashtag is #RLTReads. We can make this book club as wonderful as we want to make it. Who says that Oprah has to have the only ownership to a wonderful book club?

This Month We are Reading In My Fathers House by E Lynn Harris


Read along and join our discussion July 19th at 7 pm CST







For more Tea with Rae "Vlogs" Click here to visit her youtube channel

Monday, December 5, 2011

Monday Reflection: Moving Toward 2012: Reflect, Don't Regret!

If I Coul'da, Would'da, Should'da means nothing in the real world! I know you didn't think about it when you were doing, "It," but it's too late for regrets. As we MOVE into 2012, I want you to reflect rather than regret. This is the only life you have and each decision you make helps to build who we are for the better. It's just that we must to be willing to embrace the better.

What am I talking about? Well, some of us get stuck in the "It" and can't see our way out of it. Yes, you are really out of, "It" but the memory of being in, "It" has taken on a new life.  All the pain and unhappiness that, "It" caused takes center stage. And the spirit of, "It" begins to hold you hostage. As you move toward 2012, you must free yourself from the regret  of, "It" and reflect as a way to move toward deliverance from the, "It." This will allow you to move forward and away from, "It," and towards a better you!

Let's just take a moment now and reflect. You really are better off today because you were in the, "It" Think about it this way. For some of us as we were moving in the, "It," we were going in one direction and believed that path was the right  and for some, only direction.

But for some of us, midstream  you started to feel uncomfortable, you started to second guess the, "It" but you  thought you were too far in to change your course. While others, thought the, "It" was exciting as hell, that is, until that hell began to get hot and the heat and only the heat made you see, "It,' for what it really is.


Let me put it this way. I remember that man that made my toes curl.  #TrueStory Good Lawd, he made my toes curl. And the, "It," felt good! But over time, I started to see, "It," for what it was, but my desire to have the curl toes influenced me to accept the bad. I was so deep in, that I only saw one path, that was, my toes curling.

No, those nights I cried my eyes out because he was somewhere getting high off crack-cocaine didn't matter because when, "It,"  returned, good Lawd my toes curled again. But when my toes began to burn, I had to make the hardest decision ever, to take a different path to save my feet.  Over time you see, the fire started to rise from my toes upward and my brokenness was on this path. One day, I got the courage and I stopped the madness!


Well, it does not really matter which course I took in the beginning, what matters today is that now I know that there is a different path that I can take. I've been down that road. Yep! And I  know ALL it has to offer.  The more I  reflect on that journey, the better I  can see. And with clarity, I become a better person. Knowledge is Power that I use daily. 

 I can stay mad, frustrated disappointed, angry, and bitter and let it take on a spirit of its own and that path let me tell you, feeds into brokenness in a different way then the path you were originally on.

So what he lied and lied and lied. So what I trusted, trusted and trusted. If I stay in the regret of either of these, I will never leave this situation and it will hold me hostage for the rest of my life.

What matters today is that I've taken that experience not as a regret, but as a learning tool to do better and be better! I have my deliverance and I gladly take it to live the best life I can!


Post Script: Please visit the other post in this series

at 1:55 PM
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