I know, I know… no one uses blogs any more.
And I haven’t written here in over five years (and that was primarily a repost of an older post…), so what’s the point now? Why not abandon it all, start a Substack like the cool kids, or just let Facebook serve as a record of my reflections, for what they are worth?
There’s that word… worth. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
What life has brought my way in the last five years is hard to summarize, but here are the high points, for posterity:
2020-2021
- Retiring from my 25.5-year public school teaching career in the middle of a pandemic (meaning no retirement party, no fond farewells to students)
- Sleeping in, working on home renovations, teaching a class online (which I continued to do for 2 years), and tutoring on occasion
- Eventually, having a conversation with a former colleague who had started a nonprofit after her retirement which led to a meeting with Lee Marshall, CEO of Kids to Love, a large local nonprofit that serves the needs of foster kids and families, which led to her offering me a job as a recruiter for KTECH, the workforce development arm of KTL
2022
- Taking a few steps towards starting my own business, including attending a workshop at a local business incubator which led me to forming the first benefit corporation in Madison County, Blue Apple Bookstore and More Benefit LLC
- Beginning to talk to others about my bookstore dream, including a post on Facebook which was seen by a friend who is a business broker who then called to quiz me about what I was looking for as far as scope, location, etc.
- Being there for the birth of my grandson, Cyrus Michael, shortly after the stroke of midnight on June 23 and crying in awe of both the miracle of his life and the amazing bravery of Adrienne, who labored and delivered him with zero medication (and only a little bit of profanity)
2023
- Celebrating Turner’s graduation from Mississippi State and being secretly (okay, maybe not so secretly) delighted about his acceptance of a mechanical engineering job in Huntsville
- Traveling to Europe for a month in the fall, including two weeks in Bulgaria and Slovenia as part of an entreprenurial exchange through KTECH, then two weeks in Austria and Germany while Anthony was there for work; a visit to Dachau the day before the Israeli bombings, which happened as we were flying home, made for an emotional end to the trip
- Welcoming Alec back home after several tumultuous years in Murfreesboro, and doing my best to support him as he figured out his next steps
2024
- Increasing my hours at KTECH when my boss retired, weeks before getting a crucial phone call from my aforementioned business broker friend, who told me she thought she had found the perfect location for my bookstore
- Celebrating Harley’s graduation from Bob Jones (so weird to not be sitting on the arena floor in my faculty robe…) after a very up-and-down high school career for her
- Deciding to try to buy the business my friend was brokering and subsequently wading through the details of a business transaction that involved terms I barely knew the definition of and amounts of money that seemed impossible before putting the final touches on a business plan I’d started in 2022, getting approved for a business loan, and finalizing the sale on July 19; Thirty years to the day after I gave birth to my first child, I gave birth to a new business!
- Learning how to be a business owner, getting a bookstore off the ground, and moving Harley to college all happened within about a one-month period
- Officially cutting the ribbon for Blue Apple Books on Wednesday, September 18, surrounded by family and friends
- Surviving my first holiday retail season as a business owner, which kicked off just a couple of days after I had emergency surgery for a humongous kidney stone
2025
- Fully embracing the “and more” part of the business by collaborating with local authors, artists, other business owners and community members
- Being chosen as a stop on Jen Hatmaker’s Awake tour and planning the biggest event I’d ever planned in my life (I still can’t believe she, along with Tyler Merritt, and Mary Katherine Backstrom were at my store TOGETHER!)
- Leaving the store in the hands of my (very capable) staff for 8 days while we visited Adrienne and her family in Portland, and spent time in Washington as well, visiting family and dear friends
- Celebrating one year in business, which sadly about 1 in 5 new businesses do not get to do
- Surviving my first year filing business taxes, hosting over 60 events at the store, including over 30 author events, and being a guest on three local podcasts!
Submitting my notice to Lee at Kids to Love in the summer of 2024 was one of the most bittersweet moments of my life. The tandem emotions of elation and fear kept me up at night as I – for the first time in 40 years – faced the reality of going to work WITHOUT receiving a paycheck. Since my first job at 14, painting barrettes for a lady who created beautiful hair accessories for little girls and sold them to fancy stores, I had never gone more than a couple of weeks without earning my own money. I am very grateful that my retirement check was enough to supplement Anthony’s to cover our household expenses, with just a few cutbacks. But starting a business at 54, when – to be perfectly frank – our personal finances were not in the best of shape and we still had many years of student loans left to pay? Some might say it wasn’t the smartest move in the world. Was I worthy of taking a chance on my own dream?
I didn’t realize for quite a while that I was suppressing some pretty significant feelings of uncertainty and self-criticism, putting pressure on myself to cut corners any way I could at the store so that I could pay extra on my business loan so that I could start to at least THINK about paying myself a little bit each month by 2026, perhaps…??
I subconsciously began to question my worth, even as my dream was unfolding around me.
Menopause (something that’s whispered about but never explained, really, to women) hit like a freight train and my body started to betray me. Things that used to be easy, like straightening my legs in the morning, started being a bit of a struggle.
My calendar after work was achingly empty. No more games, concerts, plays, dropoffs and pickups, runs to Walgreens for poster board… Friendships that were the “proximity” kind (because your kids dance or play soccer together) faded and I was too distracted and stressed about getting a business off the ground to try something fun for myself or to socialize. I am eternally grateful for friends who haven’t left me alone.
What is a middle-aged woman worth once her kids are grown? When her low-key husband is happy just to sit at home after work? When her grandchild is across the country so she’s not needed for grandma duty? When her parents are 2 hours away and perfectly healthy and independent? What does she DO? How is she valued?
I have no freaking idea.
I can’t find my worth in being a business owner, because that’s obviously shallow and devoid of morality, right? Or is it?
Can I find value in learning something new every day – about myself (not always good things), about my customers, about literature, about art in all its forms, about human nature and its foibles?
About trauma and what it does to individuals and families?
About the atrocious state of mental health care (and social services, in general) in our country?
About what it is like to speak at a political rally?
About how hard it is to pour yourself into something and hope that your community would rally around it and although it was good, it wasn’t all good and you lost money?
About a once-a-month banned book club gathering and a very active What’s App group becoming your church?
About the echoes in a house with no teenagers?
Can I find value in exploring the fault lines of injustice that are epitomized by what happened in a barn in the Mississippi Delta in 1955 when you read a book (The Barn – that was much more than Emmitt Till’s story) and then met the author?
Can I find value in reflecting on the way my heart felt like it was going to explode when I introduced a New York Times bestselling author on stage in front of several hundred people who came to hear her because I took a chance and filled out a form posted on Facebook? And explode again when I saw my former student hugging her actor/writer boyfriend backstage of the auditorium where that student now teaches drama??
Or on the almost holy moment when, before locking up, you walk through your darkened store, lit only by the Christmas trees in the display window, smelling books that you chose and candles that your new friend Shannon poured, and realizing that not only did you surpass your sales goal for the day, but you introduced a teenager to a new author, helped a grandmother choose a book for her new grandchild, and wrapped an anniversary gift basket for a nervous young husband (“This year is cotton. I don’t want to get her a sweatshirt; I want it to be special.”)?
Can I find value in facing the fact that if something goes badly, it’s my responsibility. But if something goes beautifully, that just might be my responsiblity, as well?
Can I find value in learning more than I ever wanted to know about imposter syndrome?
About bonding with a stranger after a 2-minute discussion of The Poisonwood Bible?
What kind of worth can be measured in these moments of revelation and incremental, mostly experiential learning? They aren’t exactly earth-shaking, but they aren’t nothing, either.
I don’t know what 2026 will hold. None of us do, of course. My business may not survive. My marriage may not survive. My hormones may continue to fly over the cuckoo’s nest. Alabama may very well elect a former football coach – who doesn’t know the three branches of government – as governor.
I know I’m worthy of a salary, but the revenue just isn’t there yet and may not be until 2027. And that’s okay.
I will eventually figure out what I’m worthy of, because the world is not going to push me down. And my words here may only be worth something to me, but they serve as some sort of marker or milepost along my journey to perhaps writing my own book one day. Or maybe not.
And yes, I know all the spiritual-sounding answers to the worth question. Of course I do. Decades of Sunday School, VBS, Bible drill, Women’s Bible study, small group after small group, and notebooks full of sermon notes were not for naught. My brain knows the “Christian” answer, but my heart also feels the pain of not feeling quite worthy enough. Not in the realm of eternity, but in the realm of an hour from now, a week from now, a decade from now.
My ideals as an entrepreneur are admirable, sure, but what if my continued inability to consistently cook nightly dinners or keep an immaculate house or join the right clubs or say the right things at the right time mean that my empty nest years are really EMPTY years… working hard to serve the public and exemplify that solid Protestant work ethic and maybe help a few people along the way… is that enough? Who will judge if I’m worthy then? Will it be the chamber of commerce or my children and grandchildren who deem me worthy after I’m gone?
In the end, though, I guess the question is, does that even matter? What does “worthy” mean? Whether one believes in God/a god/gods or not, the connection we all have towards each other is there, whether or not we want to acknowledge it. Is anyone more or less worthy of affection, provision, community, or comfort based on their income, net worth, occupation, ethnicity, or religious affiliation or lack thereof??
Aren’t we worthy simply by being human?
Meanwhile, 2025 is the first year since 1984 that I haven’t gotten a W-2 (or any other income verification form) for a job I worked. And I think it’s okay to feel a little bit scared – or at least uncertain – about what that means (if anything) and to question these worth-related issues.
I won’t stay here long, I promise.
P.S. To my fellow grammar nerds… I apologize for the shifts in tense and person. This is just the way it came out and although I could edit, I am probably not going to do so.