Cultivated

In this episode, I read an essay that began as a protest — and became something closer to a manifesto. It asks what happens when you stop trying to prove your memories true. What if the real work isn’t verification, but rebellion? If you’ve ever struggled with truth, memory, or what it means to tell your story, this one’s for you. Subscribe for more: https://kristenhmcleod.substack.com/ Watch more...

Listen above, watch or read below. The 2x2s took modesty seriously — weaponized it, really. So naturally, denim was suspect. Unwritten dress codes were less about hiding skin than functioning as a system to keep us in line. Our sedate skirts and dresses served as uniforms for an invisible battle and served as declarations of our compliance. The 2x2s didn’t write the rules down. They didn’t have to...

Convention: Part Two In this follow-up to Convention: Part One , I return to the sacred prairie grounds of my childhood — where silence was holy, dresses were regulation-length, and folding chairs marked the line between sinner and saved. But Part Two goes closer in. Past the lawnmowers, the crustless sandwiches, the illusion of belonging. Into the cracks. If Part One gave you the lay of the land,...

Episode 01: The Cult of My Dreams Was Italian A memoir in sound — life after the 2x2s. I thought I was writing a memoir. But the present kept interrupting. This is the first episode of Cultivated , a literary memoir of resilience and reinvention after life in a cult. It's a story told in essays, unfolding in real time. It begins not with escape or revelation, but with a question: What am I now? Ra...

Every summer, we packed our bags — modest ones — and drove to a stranger’s farm. There, beneath billowing canvas and strict silence, we gathered with thousands of others who believed they belonged to the only true church on earth. We called it Convention. In this episode of Cultivated , I return to the field — literally — to tell the story of the 2x2s’ most sacred gathering. It's about heat, hymns...

In this episode, I share the story of a seemingly small moment — the day my mum turned off The Flintstones at lunchtime. I was seven years old, and what followed was a full-blown meltdown. But looking back now, I can see it for what it was: the first quiet indication that something had changed. That the rules were shifting. That the World , as we called everything outside the faith we’d joined, wa...

Episode Summary Public speaking is terrifying enough—now imagine your eternal salvation is on the line. At thirteen, I stood up to Profess my faith, declaring absolute belief in front of a congregation that expected unwavering certainty. Twice a week, I performed for an audience of severe-faced judges, mastering the art of belief—whether I truly believed or not. What started as survival training b...

In this episode, I start with squirrels - specifically, the ones taking over my backyard - but, as usual, we end up somewhere else entirely. This is a story about small, ridiculous battles: against rodents, childhood rules, Costco temptations, and the ongoing attempt to keep life from unraveling. It’s about control, chaos, and what happens when things (inevitably) get chewed up along the way. If y...

Welcome to Cultivated . This is the starting point — an introduction to what this is, how to read or listen, and a little about the faith I grew up in (the one so secretive it forgot to name itself). Whether you like to follow things in order or prefer to jump around, you’re in the right place. Each chapter is a breadcrumb, a fragment, a piece of the story — because that’s how memory works, and ho...

Before I understood what was happening, before I knew what The Truth would come to mean for my family, there were signs. My mother’s growing defiance. My father’s quiet but relentless insistence. The way a simple question— “Why do the women all have long hair?” —was met not with an answer, but with silence. This episode is about the slow pull of indoctrination, how belief is not always imposed at...

I didn't see the 2022 summer media coverage of the 2x2 abuse scandal... And then. Get full access to Cultivated at kristenhmcleod.substack.com/subscribe

As I aged I had no clue how to perform friendship, and learned—from books and magazines and far too many mistakes—how to be and how not to be a friend. I presumed once I was all grown-up, I’d understand the nuances I’d often misinterpreted. I’d settle into the deep, protected, and protective friendships I saw others enjoy. I settled instead onto the peripheries of friendship, and whether this was...

At times, I used the Coles Notes version to explain why, for example, I lacked cultural knowledge around popular TV programs from the 80s and 90s. But on occasion, I was inclined to provide a more fulsome rendering to give context to my quirks.   Get full access to Cultivated at kristenhmcleod.substack.com/subscribe

Quick notes. * These are my own definitions and have absolutely not been blessed by anyone, nor did I run them by others who might want to weigh in. At the same time, I do not think myself the ultimate arbiter to define and explain. That said, this truth is mine —a slippery concept we’ll dissect later. * Two-by-Two rules and definitions shift by region. What follows are from western Canada in the...

It is likely she did not, but she hopes she played with particular abandon at recess later that hot afternoon. She hopes she swung upside-down from the monkey bars, that she tumbled down the hill and laughed off its bumps. She hopes she ran and jumped and relished those last few free hours. She knows she understood what was coming on some level, but she was only ten, and she could not have—no one...

My favourite movie used to be Sliding Doors . It still might be, but that's not what matters here. I loved it because it played out two versions of how things could go. In one, main character Helen makes her train. In the other, she does not. The audience toggles between these versions of her life; encouraged to build what we intuit is a faulty allegiance to one of them. The life we root for is to...

Do you want to go to heaven when you die? That’s the question my dad asked when he walked me to school that day when I was about ten. I solemnly assured him that of course I did, even though I knew this to be a lie. If heaven was anything like the members of the 2x2s described it, I was certain. I preferred hell. Get full access to Cultivated at kristenhmcleod.substack.com/subscribe

Cultivated is where I’ll talk about the 2x2 cult, but only a little, because it’s mind-numbingly boring. I wish I was in one of those glamorous cults; you know, the kind where everyone drinks poison at the end? I would’ve survived to tell the tale, I’m nimble like that. . Get full access to Cultivated at kristenhmcleod.substack.com/subscribe