Me: "Hello. I've been given your number by the current shop tenant. I'm just ringing to find out a little more information about rent and length of lease and....stuff like that.....".
Shop landlady: "Ok. That's great. I'm actually speaking to you from Tenerife. We get home on Friday. I'll call you back then if that's ok?".
Me: "Of course. Great! Enjoy the rest of your holiday".
Crikey, WHAT am I doing?!
Four days later, and only five days since my initial viewing of the shop with the 'TO LET' sign still in the window.
Shop landlady: "....so unless you have any more questions then I'll leave it with you to decide if you want to go ahead. We will need an answer by Monday if at all possible as there are four other parties interested in leasing the shop and I don't want to keep them hanging on unnecessarily. But you were the first to contact me and so you have first refusal".
One weekend - all of two days - later....
Me: "So yes, we definitely want to take on the lease for the shop as soon as possible please".
After finishing the call. I turn to face The Husband who is sat beside me...
Me (wide eyed and with an increasingly knotted stomach): "It would seem that we are about to open a tea room".
"I've seen a shop" I said to my husband on his return home from a busy day of Radiography-ing at a local-ish hospital.
"Right" he replied carefully with a suspicious narrowing of the eyes whilst trying to simultaneously get a grasp of both the situation and of our youngest son who was hugging (neck locking) him."When you say you have 'seen' a shop...?"
Me: "It's up for lease. The gift shop. Just up on Baslow Road. At the top of Main Street. Next to the hairdressers. Across the road from the Farm Shop who catered the pie and pea supper for our wedding. I only went in to have a look. I was on the way home from the school run and there was a sign that said 'TO LET'.
The Husband: "OK".
Me: "There's so much more space on offer than you might expect. It's not just the one room where the shop is, they also have an office attached and there's a little yard outside and a fancy garage space that is being used as a store room. You could do so many different things with the 'bits'. I can see how it would work as a tea room and gift shop. I mean, I know I've always said that I would NEVER want to run a café or anything but it was there with the 'TO LET' sign and I was passing by on my way back from school this morning and just thought I'll go and have a quick look....you know, like when you're out shopping and you're not really looking to buy anything but you see THE perfect dress only it's a bit pricey and you know you can't really afford it and so you just try it on anyway 'cos chances are it will look bad on you and so you can just walk away from it knowing it never was actually THE perfect dress and then you need never think about that dress again".
The Husband (slightly bewildered by my onslaught): "Right. Ok. So, you went to have a look at the shop?"
Me: " I did. Just out of interest to have a look round and to find out how much it is and everything. Just so that I can then walk away from it knowing it isn't 'doable'. I mean, I know it's not something we have been planning to do necessarily (at all) but it's not often local shops come up situated right between your own home and your youngest child's school....in the ONLY place you could currently consider opening up a tea room or something and still being able to have a life".
The Husband: "So, are we saying that even though you NEVER want to run a café we are might be looking to open up a tea room"?
Me: "Hmmm...when you put it like that I guess that yes, maybe that is what we are looking to do. SURPRISE!".
"So, does it feel as if you are living your dream?" is a question that I have been asked by customers new to the tea room.
"Errrmm....(longer than expected conversational pause)...sort of....I guess...in an unplanned kind of way" I tend to mumble in response. Which sounds at best, laid back, and at worst blasé.
To say anything other than a resounding
enthusiastic” YES” sounds so ungrateful.
And I am SO very grateful for the opportunity and support to be able to do what I am doing and
to feel passionate about the things that this business of mine stands for. BUT, trying to run the tea room and
shop whilst balancing this with the REALLY important stuff that makes up life, ensuring that me and my man and my boys and my Mum and my as-close-as-family friends still get to enjoy enough time
together is really very hard work. Much
harder work than I could ever have anticipated.
In all honesty, I really never did dream about opening a tea room. You see, I had an inkling that the long and necessary hours required to sustain such a venture, and the potential worries and stresses, were actually quite the opposite of anything I might dream of. It isn't something I set out to do in any longed for sort of way....and yet here we are.
Which raises the next question: "How does a person 'accidentally' open up a vintage style tea room and shop?"
More on that next time...
