O, The Oprah Magazine articles from January 2002

O, The Oprah Magazine archives from January 2002

Letters.
January 1, 2002... We Hear You! Readers tell us their thoughts on the power of creativity the truth of storytelling, Oprah's response to the September II tragedy and other highlights. The "Creativity" issue [November) was a delight. It is extremely...

The way of truth. (Here we go).(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... WE'RE BEGINNING A NEW YEAR by exploring one of the defining values of my life: truth. Both privately and in my work in television, I have always been a truth seeker. Not a day goes by that I don't look for it, consider how I can use it to...

Choosing faith over fear: Our lives shift, dazzle and appall...and we notice we're powerless to stop the changes. Sharon Salzberg offers a way to thrive in the face of uncertainty. (Live your best life).
January 1, 2002... IN JANUARY OF 1999 THERE WAS A major van Gogh exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. As I walked through the museum, viewing painting after painting, a wide range of emotions swept through me. What I found most heartrending in van...

The Crossroads of you: The average person makes seven critical choices in a lifetime. In his new book, Phillip C. McGraw, PHD, invites you to name yours and get clear about their impact. (Tell it like it is).
January 1, 2002... WE ARE FACED WITH so many routine decisions that it would be difficult for most of us to list all the choices we had to make yesterday, let alone throughout our lives. Yet I believe each of us makes roughly seven critical choices that are life...

Suze Orman: "I'm a great fan of prenups!"; Honesty is the best policy, whether you're dealing with a fiance or a delinquent tax return. (Financial Freedom).(Column)
January 1, 2002... Q Should I fess up to the IRS? I shaded the truth to the IRS to get a much needed tax break. Now I'm nervous about it. What are the consequences of lying on my tax return? Can I make amends? A I sense fear and shame in your letter,...

It ain't me, babe: To accept blame or not to accept blame, that is the question. The answer, says Martha Beck, is to take it like a woman. (Beck on call).(Column)
January 1, 2002... IT'S A SCENE WE'VE WATCHED A HUNdred times: A public figure glares into the camera with an expression of outraged innocence and declares, "I am not a crook!" or "It was dehydration, not a drug overdose!" or "I have never had an affair!" Most...

Here's to Life!: Faced with her own astonishing baby girl, writer Lorene Cary was finally able to conceive of mystery; calm, beauty. (Aha! Moment).(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... THE WEEK AFTER MY FIRST daughter was born, nearly 17 years ago, I took her to visit my grandparents. When I was a girl, I spent weekends with them; now a married woman, I still drove over the Delaware River from Philadelphia to New Jersey to...

Showtime at the Moth: Thanks to artistic director Joey Xanders, the Moth's roving storytellig events have become urban legend among New York nightlifers. Lesley Dorman listens in. (Use your life).
January 1, 2002... T'S ALMOST SHOWTIME ON A RAIN-soaked March evening in New York City. The people lined up outside City Hall, a downtown restaurant chat sits a few blocks from its namesake, have been coaxed out from their Manhattan lairs on this dreary Monday...

Starting over (With Dog). (Order, Order!).(woman begins healing from divorce, moves into new home and new life)
January 1, 2002... A year after her husband moved out, Nora was ready to spread her wings and fly solo. But how, and where to? Julie Morgenstern helps a newly single woman sign an exhilarating new lease on life. Dear Julie, I am 43 years old and...

You and your shadow. (Uncommon Sense).(author Debbie Ford helps six women explore their lives)
January 1, 2002... We all have one--a shadowy side we project onto other people that prevents us from loving ourselves (and others) without reservation. Susan Morgan sits in on Debbie ford's workshop, which teaches women how not to be afraid of the dark. ...

The O List: "A few things I think are just great." - Oprah.
January 1, 2002... Drizzle Stick "A friend discovered this handblown oil dispenser at a restaurant. The dropper leaks just the right amount of olive oil--or, my new favorite, grape-seed oil--onto salad." (Aceitera oil dispenser, $65, Ilo Restaurant and...

Puff Pieces. (Fashion).(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... When we say "parka," do you hear "fat and puffy"? Nonsense. Here, seven women prove that you don't have to choose between feeling warm and looking sexy--you can get style and insulation in the same pumped-up package. JOANNA BACALSO, ...

Hot Stuff: Warm the cockles of your heart (and everything else) with these bliss inducers. (Beauty girls toys).(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... YOU KNOW THE FEELING YOU sometimes get in the dead of winter, when weeks and weeks of deep freeze have chilled you to the bone, the feeling that you'll never really be warm again? We're have to report a thawing trend: These bath and body...

Symphony of Scent. (Beauty).(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... Want to fill your life with fragrance, 24/7? Here a spritz, there a spritz, everywhere a spritz-spritz? Christine Fellingham shows you how to create a gorgeous aroma in every corner of your life. WHEN YOU ASK PERFUMER JO MALONE WHAT she's...

Winter hair rescue: It's cold and dry and your hair loses its oomph. Kitty O'Callaghan suggests ways to get back your bounce. (Beauty).(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... IF YOU'VE NOTICED THAT YOUR HAIR, like the landscape, seems to change under the influence of the seasons, you're right. And winter weather probably leaves it limp. As the mercury drops, so does the amount of moisture in the air, and that can...

I gotta cold in by dose. (Minding your body).
January 1, 2002... Americans catch at least a billion colds a year. That's a lot of Kleenex and a lot of misery. Nina Martin gives you a blow-by-blow report on a throat-ticklish topic and shows you ways to avoid that first sneeze. HAPPY NEW YEAR AND...

It might as well be spring: Whether it's orchids, daisies, naughty scarlet cyclamen, or merely a plot of green succulents, the best pick-me-up is an indoor garden. Happy flowering! (Comfort Zone).(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... YOU CAN DEFY WINTER with cut flowers, but they quickly droop and fade. A more lasting way to keep a room in bloom is to look inward. Anybody can grow plants in pots and make a garden in the house," says Maggy Geiger, owner of the Window Box a...

The Nutty Professor: Her English teacher's famous pie was encrusted with mystery. So, for that matter, was her life. Jeannette Batz Cooperman gets to the bottom of it. (Dish Fulfillment).(Recipe)
January 1, 2002... I HAD ARRIVED EARLY FOR NERDY honors English, my first course on my first day of college. Taking a deep breath, I sat down at the long wooden table, opened my notebook, and laid my pen across the corner, angling it for instant pickup. I closed...

Gillian Armstrong's magnificent obsessions: The director's favorite books illuminate her brilliant career. (Books).(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... I'M READING ALL THE TIME, MOSTLY FOR WORK, but the best is when I pick up a novel and I'm not thinking about whether this will make a film, I just want to read something that will take me on a journey. I want magic and beauty in the writing....

This hot thing: Rosemary Sullivan takes readers into the torrid region of themselves in Labyrinth of Desire.
January 1, 2002... The Canadian poet and award-winning biographer Rosemary Sullivan begins her eloquent meditation on "romantic, obsessive love, the hot thing we fall into," with a disquieting story. A lonely Canadian woman traveling in Mexico strikes sparks with...

Storms of life: Jean Thompson's satisfying Wide blue Yonder confronts the unsettled atmosphere of family relations.
January 1, 2002... AMERICAN WEATHER COMES rolling down off the Rockies and across the Great Plains like a traveling Shakespeare troupe, a chaotic drama, in bursts of sound, fury, and fire. These big open spaces are the Wide Blue Yonder (Simon & Schuster) of Jean...

First, do not manipulate: Bonnie Friedman's unsparing memoir, The Thief of Happiness, recounts a nearly life-destroying doctor-patient relationship.
January 1, 2002... ACCORDING TO FREUD, TRANSference--the process by which a patient's fantasies and intense emotions become focused on the therapist--is a normal and even desirable aspect of a successful psychoanalysis. But when Bonnie Friedman went into therapy...

A murder runs through it: In Judith Freeman's beautiful Red Water, three women narrate the shocking account of a massacre.
January 1, 2002... Red Water (Pantheon), Judith Freeman's revelatory new novel, was born by chance. Browsing in a used-book store, Freeman came upon The Mountain Meadows Massacre, an account of the 1857 murder by Mormon settlers of more than 120 men, women, and...

Biblio: From our shelf to yours.(five books)
January 1, 2002... * Three disparate lives converge in Martha Southgate's The Fall of Rome (Scribner), set in an elite New England boarding school "in the middle of a field so lush and vivid as to make the eyes water and shine with its light." A lone...

Stronger in the broken places: In Aftermath, Susan Brison tells the true story of her harrowing assault and extraordinary struggle back to wholeness.
January 1, 2002... ON A BRIGHT SUMMER MORNing in 1990, Susan Brison went for a walk along a country road in southern France, "About an hour and a half later," she explains, "I was lying face down in a muddy creek bed at the bottom of a dark ravine, struggling to...

Longing for home: A horrendous accident put Abigail Thomas's husband in the hospital, and their old life on hold. A year later, the author misses her cherished companion, who still can't find his way back. (Family).
January 1, 2002... I AM ON MY WAY TO PAGO PAGO BUT stop first in Rosita's for a plate of rice and beans and an egg over easy, a cup of cafe con leche. The toast here is good and I order some of that, too. The restaurant is fragrant with bay leaf and coffee, the...

The Interview Oprah talks to Rudy Giuliani: The now legendary mayor talks about his call to courage, getting emotional, boyhood words-to-live-by from his father, and his own inspirational calm after the storm.(Interview)
January 1, 2002... THE TRUTH IS POWERFUL, THE TRUTH IS BEAUTIFUL THE TRUTH WILL SET YOU FREE. But the truth isn't always easy to deliver, and it isn't always easy to accept, as Maria Housden demonstrates so lovingly in "Hannah's Gift." We've also got a few...

Bread Winner.(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... Do it with brioche! Start pudding on the Ritz! Sing the Challah-lujah Chorus! O proposes a (rich, buttery, garlic-heavy) toast to the unheralded--and amazingly versatile--staff of our lives. SO YOU'RE POUNDING, TWISTING, flexing every...

Oh Beautiful: What's going on with Nona Gaye? This radiant singer/actress, daughter of Marvin, steps out in some star-spangled colors.
January 1, 2002... "I knew I'd blown it," says Nona Gaye of her first movie audition, for the role of Muhammad Ali's second wife, Belinda, in the just released Ali, Guess what: she got the part. Gaye, 27, "grew up singing" and already has one album; she's now...

The Solace of Poetry: The poet speaks to his in heightened language, crystalizing an emotion, an insight an experience. For the space of the poem, we breathe together.(Poem)
January 1, 2002... The poem is not the world. It isn't even the first page of the world. But the poem wants to flower, like a flower. It knows that much. It wants to open itself, like the door of a little temple, so that you might step inside...

The art of becoming: Trees evolve. Cities do too, and fish once walked on land. You think your style just sits there, frozen? Stephanie Stokes Oliver and three other trend-defying women talk about changing inside and out.
January 1, 2002... I THINK WE'VE ALL FIGURED OUT that life is a series of continuing challenges. For me and many of the women I know, one of them has been to find a style that reflects who we are, as we evolve from singles to marrieds, from child-free to moms,...

To tell the truth.(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... TRUTH. We Spin it, flee from it, quash it, stare it down, and, raising our right hand in the air, swear to tell it in a courtroom. As the highest summit of art and life alike, truth isn't always pretty, but it is always beautiful. Why, after...

Hannah's gift: When her 3-year-old daugher asked her the toughest question of all, Maria Housden chose honesty, pure and unsimple.(Excerpt)
January 1, 2002... THE DOCTOR CAME INTO THE ROOM, flipped the switch on the light board, and slid the film under the clip. He used his pen to point to a large, dark shadow beneath the white outline of Hannah's ribs. "There it is." Three weeks earlier,...

Denial: A user's manual; You can't stand it. Your can't bear it. It can't be. So you look the other way. But keeping your head in the clouds, Amy Bloom warns, will cost you in the long run.(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... SOMETHINGS WE DON'T WANT TO know. Some things we cannot bear. And some knowledge, no matter how painful, is absolutely essential to our well-being. Even in disaster, perhaps especially in disaster, our natures assert themselves. Those who...

How to tell hard truths: Each of us can benefit from what physicians are learning about talking to sick people. Amy O'Connor reports on the kindest medicine of all.(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... "I HAVE SOME UNFORTUNATE NEWS for you," says Michael Singer, MD, to Ms. Jones, a 42-year-old woman who had previously been told her recent lumpectomy was a success. Today Singer reveals in a soft, modulated voice that the cancer has, in fact,...

Liar, Liar: Lying is epidemic. Think politicians, think hucksters, think get-rick, get-thin, get-happy. Is there a way to tell if someone's putting us on?
January 1, 2002... THREE DAYS AFTER THE ATTACK on the World Trade Center, I was interviewing rescue workers near Ground Zero for a magazine assignment. At one point I happened to be standing alone, sipping coffee, when I saw a group of five firemen walking toward...

Family secrets: What if the man you call Dad isn't your real father? What if your husband has another life? What if your sister is really your mother? Liz Brody uncovers a few lies that hit a little too close to home.
January 1, 2002... I WAS NESTLED SAFELY IN ADULT-hood when the skeletons started to creep. Mona Simpson showed up at a literary party about 15 years ago accessorized with a new, expensive brother: Steve Jobs (yes, that one), who had recently found out that both...

The Escape Artist. (Phenomenal Woman).
January 1, 2002... She fled an abusive arranged marriage, a brutal african prison, and a perilous refugee camp. Now Nikki Tesfai dedicates her life to helping the displaced and discouraged--52,000 of them so far-find homes and hope. IT'S 11 O'CLOCK ON A...

Stuck in a Beauty Rut?: O asks hair and makeup gurus to help enhance your natural selections. (You Ask, We Tell).(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... Q: I'm feeling bored with my beauty routine. I don't like a lot of fuss, and I don't have much time to spend on my makeup. It takes me less than five minutes to apply what little I wear, but I don't even know if I'm using the right colors....

One suit, four acts: The least ruinous way to update your beige basics is with a really fresh set of accessories. (You Ask, We Tell).(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... Q: I want to liven up my work wardrobe without flattening my pocketbook. I know it's possible to make my neutrals look new with a simple change in accessories...but how, exactly? -- Frances, Gallup, New Mexico A: We'll show you. Our...

Bread Winners: It rises deliciously to any occasion. Would you believe banana-bourbon French toast? (The Recipes).(Recipe)
January 1, 2002... CHALLAH STICKS 1 loaf challah or brioche, crust removed 6 Tbsp. butter, melted 2 Tbsp. sesame seeds 1 Tbsp. poppy seeds 2 Tbsp. dried onion 3 Tbsp. grated Parmesan cheese 1 Tbsp. dried garlic 1 1/2 tsp. kosher salt 1 tsp....

What I know for sure.(Oprah Winfrey)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2002... YE SHALL KNOW THE TRUTH, AND THE TRUTH SHALL make you free" has always been one of my favorite Bible verses--one I memorized long before I understood what it meant. I've since learned that you can't know the truth until you're willing to know...