Living

I was thinking about the little tag line on this blog's title:  "thrifting, painting, and creating for a living."  Most folks who would read that would assume that I make a living doing those three things, in the sense that I support myself and my family with that work.  I wish that were the case!  I have a day job, one that alternately exhausts and challenges me, and that day job is the reason I was able to pitch in to buy the inventory for our consignment shop. The day jobs pays the bills and gives my family financial security.  But it doesn't inspire feelings of joy, of contentment.  There are times, certainly, when I feel like I'm in the flow at the day job:  when I help someone understand a concept or I solve a particularly knotty problem or when I can help edit a document so that it's easy to understand.  But there are so many semi-negative things that go with the day job that I can't really say the day job does much for my soul/spirit.


Creating, on the other hand, makes me feel more like the real me.  The times when MC and I have painted something in the shop or created something with the Cricut have been the stuff of the daydreams I had when we talked about maybe buying this business.  Someone asked me if I wanted to turn a profit, and I answered that of course, I'd like that, but I'm mostly in this to have fun and feed my soul, my creative side, my eccentric side.  I want this business to do well so that I can have a reason to haunt yard sales and flea markets, so that I can have a reason for sporting smudges and spots of paint on my arms and legs, so that I can spend a Saturday working and see immediate results of my efforts.  I want to let my hair go back to its natural salt and pepper colors and rock long skirts and keds when the weather cools down.  I want to be the eccentric old hippy people talk about, the one who helps run that funky store down by the coast, who's always knitting or painting or doing something crazy with hats and handbags, who likes to talk about cats and books and makes a fuss over little kids.


That's what I mean by 'thrifting, painting, and creating for a living."  It has nothing to do with money for me because I'm fortunate enough to have a good day job.  It has everything to do with feeding my life, my real life, the one made up of yarn and cabbage roses, purring cats and the sticky kisses from a little girl, paint and glitter glue, fabric and thread, wood and stone, sunlight glowing through colored glass, old books and romance.


I'm a lucky, lucky old duck.

Bienvenue

At least, I think that's how you spell it.  "Welcome," in French.  Or my favorite, in my native Texan:  Howdy.


I need another blog like I need a hole in the head, but I wanted to document, more or less regularly, the craziness that goes with owning and running a small business.  We're a month in, and so far, I haven't killed anyone, we haven't gone broke, and no one has gotten arrested.


I have trouble believing I'm a business owner.  I already have a full-time day job, one that leaves me in a quasi-zombie state many days.  I also write fiction, knit, and dabble (badly) in painting and drawing.  I have a house, a patient husband, and aging parents, not to mention a Diva who happens to have four feet.  My life is full.  


And then my friend MC asked me if I wanted to buy a thrift shop with her.  I said yes, and the rest is...well, not so much history as chaos.


Buying the business was equal parts terrifying and horrifying.  (I know they're synonyms.  Work with me.)  The legal stuff alone nearly sent us running for the nearest open bar.  Licenses, registering with our state, registering with the county, registering with the Feds, getting electricity and water set up in our names, buying supplies (toilet paper is our number one priority), cleaning.  Oh my Lord, the cleaning that went on.  Now add ripping up old carpet and removing elderly tiles and throwing away piles of junk.  Did I mention the cleaning?  Did I mention that we would go home covered in grime and sweat and would get up at 5 a.m. the next day to go to the day job?  Did I mention the whole feeling like a zombie thing?


I never really knew that starting a business was so much physical work.  I never knew just how committed our friends and families were to helping us succeed until they pitched in and went far above and beyond familial duty and friendship to help us get ready in time to open our doors.  A month in, and we're still exhausted, and Mark and Mr. Tom and Miss Bobbie are still helping us  stay sane.  


It's been amazing.