The Measure of Shop Girl

When customers come in searching for a light fitting, the question that can often help them decide is:
“How high is your ceiling?”
I ask this even though I know full well that I’ll be confused by their answer.
They squint up at the shop ceiling, “Oh, about 8ft 2.”
I nod knowingly but inside I’m a blank.
I have no sense of measurement.
All I know is that a tall man is about 6ft.
That becomes my starting point.
8ft 2 is taller than a tall man, perhaps even significantly taller depending on how big a foot is, which must mean that the customer’s ceiling is tall enough to allow for a light fitting with a slight drop.
At which point I should suggest an appropriate chandelier.
But I don’t because in that crucial moment my mind is too busy panicking to follow my ‘tall man’ logic.
Instead I buy time by asking for an alternative measurement.
“And in centimetres?” I ask, “I went to school in Spain.”
Actually I didn’t move to Barcelona until I was 14, by which point I should’ve probably learnt about feet.
Annoyingly the customer is unfazed and gives me the metric measure without hesitation.
“Aaah,” I say, smiling, “that makes sense now.”
I still don’t have a clue.
That said, our lights are measured in centimetres and metres so I suppose I have become more comfortable with the metric system.
The widths of our most popular chandeliers are 35cm, 40cm and 50cm.
When people give me a measurement of something, I visualise a chandelier that’s closest to it in centimetres and then imagine that item a bit smaller or bigger.
Like a TV screen.
If someone is talking about a 38cm TV screen then I can more or less picture a 35 cm crystal cascade chandelier and get a rough idea of the size.
Except, when does anyone talk about a 38cm TV screen?
They don’t. They always use inches.
6 inches must be a very short man.
Thankfully not all our customers are geniuses and know the exact answer to the ‘how high is your ceiling?’ question.
Some are more on my level.
“Normal size,” they reply.
Or they stretch their arms in the air and wave, “About here.”
Or, “About as high as your ceiling, but lower.”
And, “It’s your traditional Victorian house but split in two.”
Or “I can touch it if I’m standing on the bed.”
In the end I just point at different lights until they get excited about one of them.
If the light fitting does hang too low, I suggest pushing a coffee table underneath it.
“That’s a good idea,” some say.
Not such a good idea for the bathroom perhaps.



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Shop Girl and the Little Tweeter

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The shop is full of bird cages.

A new pub is opening and the owner wants them wired up.

The cages are boot-sale dirty with traces of their long gone feathery occupants.

One still seems to have half a bird attached to the perch.

Stuffed?

Mum and I don’t make a move to touch them.

“They need a clean,” Mum says.

“I can do that later,” says our client.

On closer inspection, the bird is not stuffed but silk.

“Well it really should be done before we start work,” Mum says.

Normally we’d already be fiddling about with the potential lumiere. We can cope with normal dirt and nicotine but seeds and birdshit is another matter.

“I just need a rough idea,” our pub man says. “They’re not that dirty.”

“Yes, but it’s not just ordinary dirt it’s birds’ dirt.”

He looks confused.

“Avian flu,” Mum says with authority.

The thought makes me step back a little.

I feel itchy. I wonder if I’ve already got it.

“What do you want me to do then?” he asks tartly. “Take them away and clean them?”

He hadn’t banked on us getting all health and safety. It doesn’t last long.

“No it’s okay,” Mum says.

As ever, we’re too nice to put him through the hassle even if it means becoming the source of an epidemic in South London.

He says he wants the cages wrapped.

“Like Christo,” Mum says later. “You know, the one who wrapped half of Australia up in plastic.”

Mum suggests hanging CD’s in them to reflect the light.

So here’s the brief: a boot-sale birdcage with a light bulb hanging in the middle, surrounded by dangling CD’s on fishing wire wrapped up in a net curtain.

A few days later she sets to work scrubbing them.

As usual when someone brings in something battered and in need of repair, the other customers all want to buy it.

“How much is the birdcage with the CD’s?” they ask, one after another.

It spurs on the cyclical conversation of getting into design lighting.

Mum suggests doing a whole range of unusual, one off pieces.

“That’s great if you’re prepared to work for long hours at risk of getting no money,” I say, which reminds me I’m still writing.

“How are book Sales going?” customers will ask, fingering the pages of the copy I’ve placed strategically on the shop counter.

“Slowly,” I say.

They examine my picture on the front cover, then return the book to the pile and smile.

“Well, Good Luck with it.”

I wouldn’t need luck if they bought it.

Inevitably, after not buying my book, they ask how much the birdcage is.

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Mum and the Monk

I’ve never mentioned what else my Mum does.
Yes, she works in the shop but that’s only a tiny bit of it.
My Mum and her two friends actually founded and run an organisation called Silence in the City.
It’s a big deal.
They arrange for the ‘superstars’ of contemplative living to come to London to give talks on the value of silence in modern day life.
It goes deeper than that of course. These things often do.
Franciscans, Dominicans, Trappists, Revs, Dr's... some names have drawn in over four hundred listeners.
Half the post we get in the shop is addressed to Silence in the City.
You could almost say the shop is just a front for their operations.
People ring up and think the shop is their office.
They’re often women who speak very quietly and I want to tell them they’re taking the ‘Silence’ bit too far and would they speak up please.
The contemplatives that give these talks are not the types to preach hellfire to shoppers on Oxford Street or sell exclusive tickets to heaven.
These speakers are wise, humble, gentle and good-humoured.
They’re not interested in strengthening dangerous myths that cause separation between religions and cultures. Instead they shed light on our own repetitive thought patterns and separation within.
Too deep?
We had a monk stay with us last week who’d come all the way from Wisconsin.
He arrived at Kings Cross Station in full monk garb and Mum still took ages to spot him.
I thought he looked like a character from Monty Python in his long blue robe.
Once home, I made him a cup of tea.
“I’m going to give you a superior biscuit,” Mum said, and handed him a packet of almond turrón.
That’s not a biscuit! I thought in alarm.
Turrón is made of caramelised almonds and is so hard you could use it to build a fortress.
If our monk was disappointed, he didn’t show it.
He tried to break it with his teeth then with his hands.
It was still intact when he finished his tea.
“I’m going upstairs to soak it,” he said brightly.
He retired to the spare bedroom where Mum had left out a copy of Shop Girl Diaries which you’ll agree is essential monk reading material.
I know he read some because he talked to me about it later on.
For supper, he removed his blue tabard and was all in black.
“I like your undergarments,” Mum said, dishing up her famous brown rice.
“I haven’t had anyone say that to me for a while,” he said with a big smile, then added, “It’s called a tunic.”
I don’t think Mum realised she’d complimented him on his underwear until later.
Inappropriate?
Relax.
Forget piety and preacher men with secret agendas.
Good humour is a lot better for the soul.



N.B. Illustration by my Mum, Jill Benet

The Full Story (of how the Date became the Fiancé)

Thank you Date, with your one guest post you’ve managed to double my readership.

Oops, did I say Date?

I meant Fiancé.

Because it wasn’t a publicity stunt to get more readers.

Shop Girl and the Date are officially engaged!

“Holy Sh*t,” my brother said, when I told him.

I’m only just starting to believe it myself and that’s partly because I have proof.

The Fiancé once said he didn’t believe in engagement rings.

He obviously changed his mind.

In the restaurant, after reading his blog post out loud, I turned to him and there it was, sparkling from inside the ring box he’d opened upside down.

STOP!

REWIND.

I’d sensed something extraordinary was going to happen that evening.

He’d been so jumpy when I’d met him as if he’d drunk ten cups of coffee.

Then there’d been that mysterious lump in his jacket pocket that I’d accidentally touched.

He’d disappeared into his bedroom, mumbling an excuse and when he’d reappeared the lump had gone.

In the restaurant he’d wanted everything to be perfect, had looked agitated when a load of children had piled onto a table nearby.

As our desert arrived, (ice cream which would melt in the ensuing excitement), he got out his computer to post his blog online.

He hadn’t banked on the internet connection being so terrible.

It started to look like it wasn’t going to work.

“You can put it on tomorrow,” I said.

“No!” he cried, “I have to put it on now!”

Maybe I knew then.

This was clearly no ordinary blog.

Before the computer battery ran out, the connection returned and he was able to put his blog online.

By paragraph three I was in tears.

I finished reading and turned to him, and he was holding up the box with a beautiful ring he’d chosen all by himself weeks earlier.

“Will you marry me?”

In my imagination I’ve always said a clear, resounding ‘Yes’.

In real life, I was a blurry-eyed, blubbering bundle of shock.

“You haven’t said yes!” he said. “You have to say yes!”

“Yes!”

Of course yes! He was the Date! He was the hero in my book! Of course it was always going to be him!

The first person I told was the Greek waiter.

He shook the Fiancés hand then knocked on our table.

“Number 33,” he said.

I won’t forget that.

33 will always be a lucky table.

And I am a very lucky girl.

Guest Blogger 'The Date' - Big Adventure

So the ShopGirl bullied me into doing a blog.

Here it is, I am real.

And for all of you that are wondering, I’m not writing on my exercise time all the way from Guantanamo. Thank God.

But I can’t deny it hasn’t been stressful. Every time we talk about it we end up angry at the world and hanging up on each other with the excuse of having to do something. The good think is that normally leads to a cute message and a very comforting new call.

Emily loves to text. Every time I look at my inbox, there is something new from her. She tells me when she does something, also when she doesn’t. She tells me when she’s happy about it, also when she’s not. She loves to wonder about the world... and text me about it.

I’m not a massive texter and when we started going out I wasn’t use to getting these many messages and calls. I always thought girls that texted this much didn’t have much to do or were just intense. However, as time passed, I realized something; is not something you have to get used to, is something you need to understand. Now I understand, Emily wants to share even the little details with me. And the little details are what made me fall in love with her.

Like the endless hours she has spend stroking my hair whenever I’m stressed, or the funny dances she does in the kitchen whenever I make her coffee. Or the so many silly-sounding spanglish terms we both have make up that would be soooooo embarrassing if anyone actually understands.

But probably the best little detail (ok, not that little) is that I don’t have to wonder 'what if?’ because it already is. We are a team. And team silly is going on an adventure! As Emily predicted our plans go in circles. With no confirmed dates for my visa and film, it seems a bit silly to book a trip to Colombia just yet. We will go as soon as someone somewhere decides to give me a date. But today we are embarking on an even better adventure.

Nothing is been confirmed, I have no visa and no secure dates as to when, but all this has made me think a lot. I hate to be in the hands of situations and I like to make my own decisions. We are going for an early dinner date in a lovely restaurant. We will have a starter, a main and a dessert. Maybe even a glass of wine and some olives. Emily loves Olives. And so do I.

And when we finish eating and we are having un cortadito, pretending to be in a sunny terraza, I will get my laptop out and put this blog online. Yes, I’m going to be that obnoxious (100 points to anyone that can spell this word) and I’m going to get her to read it aloud there. Love in the Times of Internet!

And as she finishes and turns around I will ask her...

Shop Girl in Circles

The Date still hasn’t had his UK visa approved.
He rang up to find out when he might be told.
“Don’t know,” the woman said.
Our plans go around in circles.
One minute we’re setting off, the next minute we’re staying put and waiting for the Home Office’s verdict.
It’s frustrating. I just want to know something definite.
“I’m going to make an executive decision,” he said today. “We’ll book tickets on Friday.”
Not cinema tickets, we’ve already booked those (for ‘Alice in Wonderland’ and don’t tell me the ending because I’ve never read it).
He meant plane tickets to America and on to Colombia.
Good.
Now I’ve blogged about it, we’ll have to go.
Or will we?
As I said, our plans go around in circles.
Meanwhile I’m keeping my head down and writing a lot.
I might have to stop soon though and get some extra days at the shop to pay for this ticket (cinema and plane).
The good news is the date will finally speak for himself on Friday because he’s promised to write a guest post.
Ha! I’ve blogged about it now so he’ll have to do it.
Or will he?