My beautiful, beautiful shop

dimanche, le 13 septembre 2009

Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.
~Winston Churchill

Today I arrived to do the last stock take I will ever do in my shop. From today my shop belongs to somebody else and I am just here to lend advice, to explain procedures and to hand over what I had invested so much of myself in.

An acquaintance walks past. She’s surprised at the weight I have lost. She’s stunned that L’homme had walked out on me. She comes in for a glass of wine.

She tells me she always thought I was so confident, so brave and so strong. She tells me I created real beauty on a street that didn’t offer much beauty. She asks about my home – is that beautiful too? I tell her it is. I tell her it is full of beautiful art work and full of things that are beautiful and special to me. She tells me how much beauty I created for L’homme, the beautiful holidays I made possible for us. She tells me for her I created a haven she could escape to from the madness of the street.

For once I listen to this and I know it is true and deep down I begin to feel beautiful about me.

Suddenly everything feels right and in place. It’s been a very long time that I’ve known that the street has lost its beauty for me, it’s been quite some time that the shop has lost her beauty for me. I need beauty, it sustains me.

Back home I know I can create beauty again. Perhaps this is the end of the beginning for me. I’m not beginning to be the creator of beauty any more. Perhaps I am the creator of beauty and I can now move on to create beauty elsewhere. Maybe in another business. Maybe in another relationship. Maybe even between L’homme and I again.

Tonight I will slide between the sheets and I will be beautiful for me.

This was one of my favourite shop photo’s (again not taken by me) and it was used in many marketing campaigns I used to run. We served delicious cocktails in beautiful glasses.