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

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Studying, Not Fuckin...

I remember my first semester at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. I thought that I was hot shit! For Real... For Real. By then I had been out of Mama's house for two years. You couldn't tell my ass a shit. I had already been in love, hurt beyond anything I could imagine and I thought I was seasoned.

No one could run a game on me, so I thought. My relationship right before college had lasted 2 years. For sure he was my first love, a bad boy, who was 10 years older than me. Lawd, did I love that man. For sure he started me on the path of bad boys. Good Lawd, there is nothing like a bad boy. They keep shit exciting, but lawd, lawd, when it's bad, it's bad. There is no in between with bad boys and I seem to never learn my lesson. I will pass the nice guy up in a heartbeat for that man that makes my toes curl.  *SMDH*

But my love affair with bad boys is a whole other topic. My first love was a bad boy who taught me the ropes and at 19 I thought that I was one bad ass! That first semester at SIU-C I thought that I was the shit. That first week I met a senior. He was 6'2, the color of dark chocolate with a deep sexy voice, good lawd, he was fine. Our eyes met in that orientation room and it was on.

That week before classes started, I spent every day with him. How lucky could a girl get, so I thought. He was so sweet to me. Each day we would hook-up, he would show me the campus and we would have dinner. Now, I ain't even gonna lie. This was the 80's and pregnancy was all I had to worry about, so I thought. So yes, we did that thang, sure did.

Now let me be honest again, the sex was ok. For sure he was not the man I had grown accustomed to in the last two years. A bad boy in bed he was not, but he would do. I wasn't at school to fuck anyway, I was there to learn. I had decided that I didn't need the lovin to be extra good, cause I just might not get any work done.  But I was still in that phase where I was lookin for someone to love me. Yep, he would do, so I thought. No one wants to be alone and I thought how lucky am I to have found someone that first week.

That first week before classes we were thicker than thieves. Then classes began and I didn't see him every day, but we sure talked at least once a day. Then that second week of school I saw him less and less and talked less. His excuse was always school. One day he said, "Come on baby, give me a break. I have so much work to do. I can't let anything interfere with graduating in January."

It sounded reasonable. It really did. So I got over myself and started to buckle down with my studies. By that fourth week of school, I saw baby boy less and less and less, but he made sure he tapped that thang once a week.  I had already decided that I was over the fuckin anyway, once a week was cool with me, but I did want a boyfriend. Someone I could grow with. Someone who in time would love me and we could then make a life together.

Here I was 19, looking for a lifelong partner, when I should have been trying to develop myself. Use education as a way to uplift me from my circumstance. Mama had put me out my senior year of high school and I've been putting bread on my table ever since. If ever anyone needed an education, I sure did.

Back then I should have been spending my energy on what my future would look like, about me, for me. But instead, I started studying less and worrying about him more and more.

Now let's be for real, there are only so many times that you can call a man and not get a call back without it starting to beat away at your self-worth.

But back in the day, I didn't know any better and I suffered through the no return calls. I had to learn, that there is no point in tracking him down. If he wants to be with you he will.  You will NEVER have to ask, "When am I going to see you?"  If he wants to be with you, there will be NO doubt! He will show up anyway he can.

I had to learn that. It was a rough and long lesson, but I got it!  I don't chase NO men. Bullshit ain't nothing, if you want me, you know where to find me. But back then, I was young and all I really knew was that I didn't want to be alone.

The time spent with him was less and less and less and less and less. But for sure, his non fucking ass made his way over to my dorm to get his once a week fuck and my stupid ass, spread my legs to hold on to a man I didn't even really have. It had become a nasty cycle and I couldn't see an end. I didn't like how it made me feel, but the feeling of being alone made me hold onto nothing.

Then one day it all came crumbling down. I saw him walking on campus holding hands with a girl. I was too embarrassed to confront him right then and there, but for sure we had that show down. He dismissed me with a simple explanation. "She's been my girlfriend for the last three years. Everyone knows we are together, I thought you knew too."

What the fuck could I say? Really, I had accepted whatever he had given. I had learned a hard lesson, that you can't blame someone for how you allow them to treat you.  Looking back, I'm sure that I should have been studying and not fucking. But the books got lost in the desire to be loved.  It took years to learn that self-love, should always be the first love and once you understand your self-worth you will never allow someone chip away at it.









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