Store

My friends Heather and Topher opened their store today. I got to help them finish getting ready this morning, and then I got to watch them open the door to the crowd that had formed outside--waiting.

I didn't plan on being there early or helping them. And I don't know if the help I gave truly outweighed the distraction of having me there, asking questions and gabbing. But what a thing it was to sit on the floor behind a bookcase in the back, finishing up a sandwich board for the sidewalk, listening as the moment came when all was ready and there was nothing to do but open the doors. Quiet happened, suddenly. My two friends paused in the last peaceful moment, and told each other how proud they were. Then the door opened, the crowd stepped in, and this thing, that had been coming so slowly, arrived.

Other people offered more and better help leading up to this day. They deserved to be there in my place. But by some fluke I was one of very few who got to watch the first real-life moments of this long planned-for dream. The memory of this morning is one of a few rare personal treasures that I didn't look for or earn, but stumbled upon. And having so unexpectedly found them, protect all the more fiercely.