About the Site

I own every issue of O, The Oprah Magazine. At first it was fun–I like Oprah well enough, and I thought the magazine was good. But with a lot of magazine subscriptions in my name and not a lot of reading time, I usually put O aside “to savor later.”

Later has never happened, and now the magazine is in its eighth year. Needless to say, these suckers are starting to take up a lot of room in my Chicago apartment. What was once kind of quirky (”Hey! I own every issue of O! And you know what? That first one is out of print!”) is now feeling like a bit of an albatross around my neck. My husband (the Boy) says they don’t take up much space, but I beg to differ. Also, when answering magazine quizzes about clutter, I know I’m not fooling myself when I say, “Well, no, I don’t have every issue of National Geographic. I don’t even subscribe to that!” But I realize they don’t literally mean National Geographic, and the O’s are starting to take up enough geographic territory on their own. I don’t want to become that person, the Woman Who Owns Every Oprah Magazine.

Because I’ve kept them for so long, I do actually want to read them and see if they do what they actually proclaim they’ll do: Help you live your best life. Can a magazine really do that? Is it the power of Oprah that makes it so? Or is the magazine just a feel-good measure and a bunch of mumbo-jumbo psychobabble?  Or is it all bullshit, and do we need to toss this self-help crap to the curb?

Please note: Yes, I tend to swear a fair amount. Sometimes they’re just the best words to express my feelings.