Maybe it is a time to fly

People keep mentioning all the great possibilities that lie ahead of me now. They talk about the next chapter; the new adventures and all the opportunities I'll have.

It's true. I will have many chances to move on in other directions. Unless you've had a small business it's hard to realize how much falls upon just one or two individuals and how often time is no longer your own. The daily hours of the shop, seven days a week can be wearing but more importantly it can drag you into a state where you are no longer growing.

Perhaps I was there, as to run and operate the store took so much of my efforts and energies. Sometimes I think it's possible to slip into that without even realizing because when one is is a sheltered state of routine maybe we forget to look outside of ourselves. I think there are things I'd like to do; try; fiddle around with jewelry making perhaps. But the time and energy wasn't there lately and I may have missed seeing how small my world became.

This could be my chance to find a new love and my next passion in life. I have to remember that become a vibrant and beautiful butterfly one must shed the protective dull grey cocoon to move forward. Maybe, in the upcoming November and December and all the other months to follow, maybe I'm going to find my colors after all.

#locallyowned #sayinggoodbye #thefinal90 #endofanera #independent #retailer #beloved #shop #familiar #icon #favorite #store #momandpop #lettinggo #closingannouncement #confectionaryshop #memories #small #cornerstore #chocolateshop

After 19 years, only two weeks remain

12:38 am and I'm pulling up to the parking lot at the store. There is a lot to pack, so much left to do and yet manage to keep the shop straight for customers to navigate. There are still a few days left to be open for business.


I'm here now because to come in each morning gets harder and harder and some days I can't stand the questions from people or the looks. Tonight I'm alone with the shopping center and while I'm pulling down things to sort, pack up or mark down I can lose myself in loud angry music. During the day hours I have neighbors to consider but for now I can try to drown out my feelings.


I think back over so many years and memories and too many people and customers and experiences to count. Being a small business owner is special and for me it was a wonderful time. I hate the saying "it's time" when everything in me scream that it's not and yet the circumstances that are dragging this place down are out of my hands. It is time and I'm still fighting to hold on.

#thefinal90 #storeclosing #endofanera #favorite #customers #decades #business #community #icon #sweetshop #beloved #local #smallbusiness #favorite #pennycandyshop 

The many stages of saying goodbye

I thought I'd been through the challenging parts already. So many things this far have been far harder than I anticipated and I'll admit that for a few days earlier this month I actually breathed. In a way it seemed that some of most difficult tasks which had loomed on the horizon were completed and now there was no turning back.

I'd given the required notice to my landlord and after days of dragging my feet had finally posting the "closing forever" signs. I'd learned how to field questions of all varieties and varying degrees of rudeness and had even made a few feeble attempts to take some of my personal items home from the store.

But for just under two decades this store HAS been my home: it's where I've laughed, learned, cared, grown, educated, cried, and where I swore I'd never give up on something I loved so much. It was, as I'd mentioned in a previous post, the place where "I'd come out of the dark" as a shattered life was rebuilt and a new place in the world was created.

This shop where I'd connected with so many hundreds and thousands of people across the years, was so much more than "just a job" to me and to some extent when you run your own ship I think you have to feel that way. I made a mistake that will be hard to warn others about and difficult to explain; I'd fallen in love with my business. That's not something you should ever do I guess, because when if the time comes when you have to say goodbye, it's going to be so much more than just a change in where you work. It's going to hurt like hell. I know that now because I'm there.

#sayinggoodbye #finally #closing #endofanera #goodbyemomandpop #thefinal90 #storeclosing #lovelocal #community #choices #small #shops #localbusinesses #closed #lettinggo #after35years #loved

I'm not good with change

....but I'm learning.

2:35am and I'm dead tired but not sleeping. I'm an onion tonight, peeling off layers, and every time I open my eyes it seems sadness drips out. I am stronger than this, I know......


I have always hated change, lived a life for almost 20 years where little happened to disrupt the norm. And so it must come as no surprise that this ending after almost as many years does sting and tug at my heart.


Some people have an attachment to things, such as sports cars, jewelry, or luxury vacations. I craved being myself in the world that I thought I'd come alive in; the place where I'd found my passion and spirit for life. For the first time in my life things fell into place and from a deformed spirit grew something that was mine.


I know, how can a job or a business mean so much? Maybe we aren't all alike, and maybe what brought my soul to life wouldn't thrill yours. But I found my place in the world for a time and although I'm grieving the loss of this thing that helped me become whole, I have to believe there is more out there. I'm sure this isn't where my story ends. It just happens to be the place where I'm pausing, learning to let go and finding out what's next.



#lettinggo #movingon #sayinggoodbye #finally #closing #endofanera #goodbyemomandpop #thefinal90