October 31, 2002~~6:41 p.m.
Where am I Going and Why Am I in this Handbasket?
I am officially in Hell. Things appear to be getting weirder by the day, here at e.ScIenTOlogy. Recall for a moment, my adventures with �Rowena� the course lady. You can read of the adventures I had in Legoland here. So we have established that she�s a freak, right? Well, maybe we HAVEN�T. I think I should rewind and give you the full story� Picture this: a large woman, about 5 feet 10 inches tall, about 200 pounds, strawberry blonde hair cut to just below the chin and having absolutely NO style whatsoever. Rowena likes to pretend to have mall bangs, but there just aren�t enough to really get the HEIGHT you can tell she�d like them to have. The best way I can describe her face as is a sort of wide-eyed, horsey, brainwashed wonderment. She�s not exactly ugly, but not a looker, by any means. She�s got a big mouth, big teeth and big eyes. Rowena is scary. She wears a lot of polyester blends. She favors shirts with bizarre color combinations and patterns. I have seen her in shoulder pads once or twice. She also is apparently the President of the Rayon Fan Club. Rowena is NOT, by any means, a walking fashion statement, unless that statement is �I have no idea what has happened in the world of clothing since mid-1982.� Thus, let me tell of a horrifying encounter with Rowena several months ago. I was at course. She said she liked my shirt. I said �thank you.� Then the following happened: Rowena: �I like how you dress.� Lauren: �Thanks!� Rowena, sighing with contentment: �Yeah. It reminds me of me.� Um, whatthefuck?!?! I work at J. Crew. All of my clothes are from J. Crew. I have a pretty classic style. I have even been unofficially voted �best dresser at e.SCienToloGy.� My style is NOWHERE near hers. I wanted to barf all over her blouse with the swirling print of clocks and chains on it. Later in the conversation, she asked about my sister. I said, �Yeah, she�s a lot different from me. She looks a lot different.� And Rowena said in all earnestness, �Oh yeah? Is she really tall and thin?� What do you say to THAT??!! I didn�t know what to say. Last I checked, I was tall (5�8�) and though not waiflike, I definitely don�t qualify as overweight. That is just a little glimpse into the peculiarity that is Rowena. So, of late, I have been extremely busy at my job at e.SciENtOlogy. I have been working many many hours of overtime and this would all be fine and good if it weren�t for my coursework that had to be put on hold because I was so busy. I was just about to finish the course called �Formulas for Business Success.� It is a course that I had been working on, 2 hours a week, for several months. This, dear readers, was NOT a course to take lightly. I learned some significant theories in this course. One of the things I learned was that if you don�t do your job, you could be fired. Another was that if you DO do your job, you will be productive and make more money for the company. Lastly, and likely most importantly, I learned that the SCieNTolOgiSts are even more freaky that at first glance. Here�s the thing about Rowena. Whenever you appear to be skipping course, she pages you. She emails you in the morning to confirm that you�ll be there. And if those tactics don�t work, why, she pays you a visit to your cubicle. No amount of �I�m REALLY busy today� will deter her. She just says, �well, if you think you�ll be busy later, but you have time NOW, can you come down right this second?� And you say, �no, but thank you very much� and then she stares blankly at you through her evil brainwashed eyes and tries to garner part of your soul for her very own. Then, and only then, does she lumber off into the black hole that is the course room and you are left to squirm in irritation at the fact that you are stuck working in a place that is violating all kinds of labor laws and infringes on violation of separation of church and state, or at least, church in the workplace. So I managed to avoid course for about two months. But then Rowena decided to go to my boss and tattle on me. What she didn�t know was that my boss and I had joined forces in excusing me from course. So I wasn�t in trouble like she THOUGHT I�d be. Then I went on vacation to Sniperville. I had an excuse that week, because it would be a short work-week for me. Then, the next week, I had an excuse that it would again be a short work-week for me because I�d just gotten back from vacation. Then, last Friday, we had almost a full day off for e.sciEntOloGy fun day at a country club where we all clapped for how wonderful we all are and played sloppy volleyball. I thought I was in the clear. Then Monday came. Before I even got to work, Rowena was on the prowl. My boss informed me straight away that Rowena had asked about my schedule for that day. I was advised to just go finish my course and be done with it. So I did. I finished it in two days. Shortly before the end of the course, I was forced to read (as part of the materials) a diatribe by L. Ron about the U.S. Government and how it is on the brink of collapse (this was written in 1986), how taxing the individual is wrong wrong wrong, how Capitalism reigns supreme, but a little socialism is good too. Um, hello? I didn�t think we could have socialism without taxation, but maybe I�m wrong. And although I�m not a huge fan of the U.S. and our foreign policy, it appears that in relation to other places, we�ve figured out a pretty good method and shock of all shocks, have survived at least 16 years longer that L. Ron thought we would. Meanwhile, the whole essay was completely disjointed, didn�t make any sense and ended up in a completely different place than where the thesis statement led the reader to think it would. I read it twice hoping it was just me, but then, no, it was actually L. Ron. So I was annoyed. Because I agree with taxation. I even thwarted Rowena�s attempt to get me to attend a demonstration against the raising of taxes at the capital a few months ago because I�m a pro-taxation voter. I guess she�s a total idiot because she hasn�t figured out yet that I�m a liberal democrat. She said to me, �Hey Lauren! There�s a demonstration at the capital this Saturday to protest raising taxes if you�re interested!� Assuming, I guess, that EVERYONE is against the raising of taxes. So I said, �Well, what if you�re NOT against raising taxes?� And she was floored. �How could that be?� she probably wondered Anyhoo, so there I was, reading this fucked up L. Ron essay that didn�t even pertain to the bizarre course I was taking in the first place. So at the end of the course, Rowena had me fill out a sheet called the �Success sheet.� She calls it my �success story.� Yeah. This course was a success. Whatever. It�s basically the e.ScIEntoLogy version of a professor review in college. I took the opportunity to blast the fact that I had to read the poorly written political statement by a freak. I was cordial in my �success story� but I tripped Rowena up on the word �diatribe.� She wasn�t sure what to make of it. This is funny, in a way, because one of the things about sCieNtolOgy is that they promote the idea of looking up words you don�t understand so that you can understand concepts better. (And this was a multi-million dollar venture, this religion, yes it was. I am never short for fodder for a good strong, �well, no SHIT� around here, believe me.) They have dictionaries all over the course room. I�m not big on dictionaries. They are helpful, yes, but it is a rarity that I come across a word that I don�t understand. Rowena didn�t seem to catch on that I have an extensive vocabulary. She doesn�t like it when people can get through a whole entire course without cracking the dictionary even once. Sometimes I think they make things so confusing and use words in the completely wrong context so that you HAVE to question the phrasing and then Rowena swoops down and takes the opportunity to shove Webster under your nose to help figure out the correct definition of the word �the� for you. So I thought it was really humorous that there were footnotes throughout the �Formulas for Business Success� course and a glossary at the end (I think the last time I had a glossary in a book was in 5th grade) to help me understand things such as who they were talking about when they said �Roosevelt� and my particular favorite, what the term �hell bent for leather� meant (because he used that in a sentence in STUDY MATERIALS). In case you were wondering, it is British slang. And the definitions aren�t even real definitions. They�re just L. Ron�s definitions. . And then there was the moment when I thought I had been inadvertently zipped back to the 1950's where racism was okay, but soon I was to realize that no, it was only pure, unadulterated ignorance that slapped me so hard in the face. I had to write an example of a time when unproductivity had been rewarded in the workplace. So I made up a lame story. And then Rowena says emphatically, "Yeah! I once worked in a place where they had affirmative action and they had to hire a certain number of colored people, and they hired this black girl who didn't do anything and it was just AMAZING!!! I'm so glad there's no more affirmative action!!" What a fucking idiot. Apparently, she has forgotten that I have a boyfriend who is MEXICAN, that you don't use the term "COLORED PEOPLE" EVER, and that with the exception of the bizarre and lawless world of e.Scientology, affirmative action still exists. But I didn't even bother to try to explain it. I was too filled with shock. Also at the end of the course materials was a biography about L. Ron. They made him look really good, too. And did you know, he never really DIED, he simply �departed his body.� Yep. He sure did. Well, I can tell you, I�m pretty much �hell bent for leather� to �depart� this weird ass place.
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