A Hug That Changed My Life

Yesterday I hugged a customer at the store. I am a hugger. I have always been a hugger, and I plan to stay that way. I believe hugs could save the world.

Yesterday I hugged a customer at the store. I am a hugger. I have always been a hugger, and I plan to stay that way. I believe hugs could save the world. I hug people, trees, dogs, cats, and the occasional lilac bush. I often end my notes with, “hugs….” A hug will set you free.

But yesterday this particular hug deeply changed my life forever.

A woman came to the store to shop in support of a local school. We were hosting a charity shopping day at the store. She bought a pile of gifts. She was generous with her shopping, both in what she chose for others and in splurging a bit to help the school. At one point, she handed me two handmade artist plaques and said she wasn’t sure who she would share them with, but she just knew they would love them.

When we were finishing her sale, I found myself in a conversation with her about her battle with cancer. She has stage 4 colon cancer. She has been in treatment for over two and half years. She is beautiful. If she didn’t have the tell-tale regrowth hair that often screams CANCER to the world, I would have never known she has cancer.

She spoke frankly with me. She never looked away. She was honest, direct, kind, and flawlessly open. She didn’t feel sorry for herself. She did not hide her pain or dramatize it. She was heroic.

I came around the counter and asked if I could hug her. She graciously said yes. We embraced for longer than you would normally hug a person you just met. Her hug was warm, kind, and open, just like her words.

I had to take a handful of deep breaths when she left. My life was forever changed. I believe I will remember our exchange for the rest of my life. My wish is that the memory will come to me often. I deeply hope I can grow to be as honest, giving, calm, and willing to be fully alive as this remarkable woman.

What happens next is unknown for her and for me, but isn’t that reality for all of us?

Hugs…

Casey

Here is a handful of hug-moments. Note the joy, love, and happiness being shared.

My daughter and father sneak in a hug.
My daughter and my father sneak in a hug.
Customers hug at the holidays.
Customers hug at the holidays.
Proof hugs and kisses make people happy.
Proof hugs and kisses make people happy.
Group hugs are always encouraged.
Group hugs are always encouraged.
My pup and daughter stop for a hug.
My pup and my daughter stop for a hug.
This is my nephew "holding hug" my giant pup on the sofa. This is one of the best hugs you kind enjoy.
This is my nephew “hug holding” my giant pup on the sofa. Another great hugging variation!

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Singularly Lovely

I read Vogue magazine every month. I like to get my fashion mixed with a bit of substance.

I read Vogue magazine every month. I like to get my fashion mixed with a bit of substance. Yes, I am the dork that reads their well-written articles. (W Magazine is also on my bedside table.)

I came across this short piece about crystal necklaces in the recent issue. They were featured in a runway show this season. I got a bit of a rush to find something we sell at our store featured in Vogue.

STUFF sells Swarovski crystal necklaces, earrings and bracelets. We work with a designer in Berlin, Germany. They have been a STUFF staple for many years. The single strand – like you see in this image – is one of our most popular.

Vogue 2013 View Article I added one to my personal collection a few years back, and find that I wear it more often than I believed I would. One of my favorite ways is to throw it on with casual T-shirts and skirts. It takes my weekend run-about wardrobe to a new level. And, if I find myself invited to last minute afternoon drinks, I am dressed.

I loved seeing them featured in Vogue. I felt so fashionable and current.

Casey

Vogue Quote Sept 2013

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The Storm Passed

In recent months, I have been drowning in the flood of my own life. A “perfect storm” of work, parenting and volunteering put me on my knees. I had a plan. I really did.

In recent months, I have been drowning in the flood of my own life. A “perfect storm” of work, parenting and volunteering put me on my knees. I had a plan. I really did. But then those unexpected and unlikely events started to hit.

Every time I turned around, another (medical, staff, tenant, dental, roof, appliance, plumbing…) issue hit. Again, again and again. I thought this time I was going to break, thankfully I had help with the materials and equipment from http://profoam.com.

Then last week my daughter climbed into my bed after a bad dream. I was still awake, lying in the dark holding back tears of fatigue and fear. She crawled onto my stomach, her limbs falling past my knees and over my sides as she drifted back to sleep.

I looked down at her in the dark, and just like that the storm passed. Only one thing actually changed…me. My heart could finally be heard above the screaming in my mind.

I let go.

Last Thursday, when an actual storm ripped my roof open, tore siding from my house, and knocked the power out, I lit candles, put buckets out to catch the water, locked the windows, and cuddled up on the couch with my child and fell asleep in the warm glow of my home.

A home isn’t a house. My house may very well fall down around me one day, but my home will always be warm, well lit, and open to the people I love and who love me in return.

Casey

Casey Simmons' Daughter

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You Can’t Always Get What You Want

I was frustrated last night. Angry frustrated. I wanted to walk in a charity walk with my Dad, and everything in my life conspired against me all afternoon and into the evening. I didn’t have a pity party, but I did throw a private hissy fit.

I was frustrated last night. Angry frustrated. I wanted to walk in a charity walk with my Dad, and everything in my life conspired against me all afternoon and into the evening. When I called him to finally tell him I just wasn’t going to make it, I got my stepmom on the phone. My voice broke when admitting I wasn’t going to make it. I didn’t have a pity party, but I did throw a private hissy fit. It went something like this:

Why is this city getting so big and busy that I can’t get to Corporate Woods in 20 minutes at the end of rush hour?

Why would a charity hold an event on a Friday night and have it begin at 6:30? Don’t they know people own businesses that don’t close at 5pm?

Why did I have a child? Didn’t I know he would grow up and have a busy life and need rides?

Why did I marry a man who is always busy with his own small business?

Why can’t I just do what I want to do and not have so many people demanding so much of me? Don’t they know I just want to walk in the dark with my Dad and remember his incredible journey through cancer? Don’t they know I want to hold a delicately glowing balloon in the quiet of a wooded suburban setting?

cookiesThen the moon came out. The biggest, most beautiful moon of the year so far. By that time of my night, I was back at my business sneaking in a few important tasks between car rides for my young man. I stepped out into our back alley to get something out of the car and was blown away by the brightness of the night sky. Then I saw the monster moon. I turned, locked the door to the store, and walked around the block.

Quietly. Slowly. In the glowing night. By myself. And, in every way, my Dad was there with me while I quickly put the hissy fit to bed.

Sloane

p.s. At the end of the evening, I realized I was where I was supposed to be last night. When my final pick-up of the golden child occurred, the first thing he said to me was, “Mom, did you see that moon?” I told him that indeed I had and that I had bathed in her amazing powers. That’s when I got the look that only a sixteen year old can grant.

p.p.s. I know you’ve been humming The Stones while you read this. That makes me smile!

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Peace In The Noise

Yesterday I pretty much lost it at the intersection of 47th and Main Street. Yes, it was rush hour. Yes, it’s a busy intersection. Yes. Yes. Yes. Whatever.

Yesterday I pretty much lost it at the intersection of 47th and Main Street. A gaggle of geese decided to cross the busy intersection. And they were doing a darned fine job of staying within the cross walk, if the painter of said lines had been into jaywalking. They were lovely and in lockstep with their mission.

Some jerk – several, in fact – decided they didn’t have time to wait for them to finish crossing and proceeded with the lights to curve tightly around the birds. The birds just stood still until they had passed and started walking again. No squawking. No flight. No bird hurt.

Just me in my car fighting back tears that could not be contained. Yes, it was rush hour. Yes, it’s a busy intersection. Yes. Yes. Yes. Whatever. This was a chance for everyone within eyesight to take a moment, watch nature overcoming engineering, and wait for the magic to end.

Yes. I know this is an owl in a geese story. Casey and I spotted it less than an hour after I sat in peace with the geese.
Yes. I know this is an owl in a geese story. Casey and I spotted it less than an hour after I sat in peace with the geese. Look at how peaceful.

I have stated before, in older blogs, that I do not condone driving and crying. It’s dangerous. So I kind of stopped crying when it was time to press on the pedal, but several tears wouldn’t stay lidded up. They needed to finish, and it gave me time to process where these emotions in me were coursing from.

I work hard. Most people do. I work – and play – at a speed that thrills me. Most people do. However, I am embracing more and more the peace that can be found in the noise. When a funeral procession is moving toward me, I pull over and live in the peace of a few minutes remembering those in my life who have been escorted in darkened and cooled hearses. When an ambulance is roaring behind me, I pull over and remember a sister whose last ride was in a brightly lit boxy vehicle manned by professionals.

And when geese cross the road – the road that is leading me to my work and all that my life has in store for me – I stop and wonder at the beauty and power of slow, precise footfalls.

I am beginning to find more peace in the noise and live in it. Yesterday I did so for as long as it took for my feathered friends to get to greener grass. Funny, we were headed for the same thing.

Sloane

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Unemployable

I have reached an age where I know for a fact that technology is outpacing me. As my husband and sister read this, they are cackling because I am the least tech-savvy and tech-interested person in their families.

I have reached an age where I know for a fact that technology is outpacing me. As my husband and sister read this, they are cackling because I am the least tech-savvy and tech-interested person in their families.

I have mentioned to friends and strangers that one of the deep-seated reasons I support the Women’s Employment Network is because I am convinced that I am going to have to utilize their amazing services if this dream business I share with my sister ever fails. The main reasons: I really don’t know how to make a PowerPoint display, and I can get easily tripped up on implementing calculations in Excel. Clearly, I will need to be trained for today’s workforce.

Unemployable in today’s society. That’s me.

Thank the goddess I am an entrepreneur.

IMG_4781 September starts our busiest four months of the year at STUFF. Right now, I am buried up to my eyeballs in paper, cardboard, pricing labels and spreadsheets. Casey, my partner in crime, is buried in artist product, display ideas, and training of current employees and possible new hires. It is a killer month that we love…and live through.

IMG_4782

Last month in New York, on our morning walk to work, I saw two men sorting – by color! – empty glass bottles. The street on which they had set up shop was closed due to the construction of a new subway stop. They had found a tree for shade and were color-sorting glass and stacking it. The sound of their endeavors caught me first and found me fumbling for my camera. Not only were they helping to save the planet, they were working quickly and efficiently in a makeshift work environment. What the end result of their work was, I do not know and did not ask.

IMG_4783

My mind raced to these images yesterday when I had set up a work station for myself on three cardboard boxes right outside my office door and was holding the papers from blowing in the fan with a tack into the cardboard. An hour later, I thought of those men as my sister climbed the stairs with her hand drill, cell phone, stuffed file folder, and cup of iced coffee. She, too, was setting up shop and getting to work where she needed to be, which was not at her desk.

She amazed me because she had brought her phone to work. Mine? Well, mine was way over there next to the keyboard of my computer, being charged. Someone had forgotten to charge it over night. Understandable. She must have been really busy.

Sloane

p.s. These men had me mesmerized. Look at how tidy their work space is. The boxes are lined up perfectly and practically squared to the curb. Right there on 35th Street just west of 9th Avenue.

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Copyright Casey Simmons and S. Sloane Simmons. People who steal other people's words & thoughts are asshats. Don't be an asshat.