My 2nd Blog

HI EVERYONE, ITS GGB (GLAM GRANDMA BLOGGER!)

WELCOME TO MY 2ND BLOG

So here I am again keeping you up to date on the movements of a travelling Glam Gran Entrepreneur!

Currently, I am writing this on a plane en-route to Barcelona for a business event with my fab company ‘It Works'.  I am really excited to meet up with all the fellow distributors that I have worked alongside for the past 7 years. Every so often we meet up for training events to keep us all motivated, and how could I miss this one in the fabulous city of Barcelona!

Of course, I had to make sure I left some extra time for retail therapy!

I joined 'It Works' in July of 2011 having spent many years in the service industry working mostly with women. After being a shop owner a few times, paying high overheads and managing staff, I finally settled into a fabulous business model which meant I could work from home, and also from anywhere in the world, which suited my lifestyle. I am still very active with this business, and I am loving it!

I am not really sure when I finally discovered that I am in fact an Entrepreneur. It took years of opening businesses and designing new products before I realised that this was my vocation in life. In my future blogs, I am going to recall all the businesses I opened, it should be good fun for you all to read about!

As I said in my first blog I have a wealth of experience to offer and I will enjoy sharing this with you.

So let's reminisce a bit!.......

I started my career at 15yrs old as a hairdresser. It was in the 60's and most of us girls who didn't follow a professional career pursued either secretarial work or hairdressing. My sister had followed this career and I tended to copy everything she did. She is 4 yrs older than me and I adore her. She has only just retired from hairdressing after a career spanning 57yrs!

So there I was a lively and determined teenager, who even then had no patience and hated being told what to do, hence the reason I got out of school as early as I could. I was always in trouble with my father who had been a sergeant major in the army and stood for no nonsense but somehow I always managed to get round him even when I was consistently grounded for coming home late after an evening out with my friends.  

I often reflect on how different my life would have been had I continued with my education. I don't have any regrets because I have taught myself whatever I have needed to further my career path. In fact, I have absolutely no regrets about anything I have ever done. I never look back, I only live for the day and look forward to the future.

So back to 1966. I found a job working for a handsome and charismatic hairdresser who owned a salon in Edgware Middlesex called ‘Hair by Paul’. All the clients were in love with Paul and the salon was always packed, often with clients queuing to get in. I jumped at the opportunity of cutting out 3 years of apprenticeship by working like crazy at learning hairdressing skills from the fabulous 'Paul of Edgware'. Within one year I was fully qualified and pretty soon I was his junior and taking over his clients when he wasn't at work.

I was earning about 15 shillings a week in tips and a small salary, but I was still giving most of the money to my mum & dad as we all did in those days, but I still managed to spend the rest  of the money I had left in the local fashion shops in my lunch hour!. 

It was the days of 'Vidal Sassoon' and I used to cut all my friends hair and practise on them. I remember their mothers being mad at me for cutting 'w' & 'v' shapes in the back of my their hair, but I was passionate about learning to be a really good hairdresser, and I needed them to be my models, that's what friends are for right?

Before long I built up my own clientele and was working hard when at 16 yrs old I met what was to be my husband of 48 yrs to date.

Tony Commissar was going out with my best friend and he was 7 yrs older than me. He was a semi-professional gymnast and worked out in a gym in Swiss Cottage North West London. He owned a fabulous E Type Jaguar and lived in a huge house. This was overwhelming for me considering I was a London taxi driver's daughter living in a small rented 3-bed semi detached house. He was a businessman who worked in his fathers business which was manufacturing corrugated cardboard packaging.

Ginger! Argh! I never went for that look, always preferring the dark swarthy continental look, but for some reason Tony Commissar got me to change my mind. Much older and more worldly than me, with a fantastic body from all his gymnastics, I couldn't resist this man.

But boy was I in for 4 yrs of heartache!

Just to give you an idea of my husband's character, at the time I met him he happened to be going out with my best friend. Unbeknown to him she was also seeing another guy, but her family was encouraging her relationship with Tony due to family connections.  

When I was introduced to Tony's friend who became my boyfriend for a while (until he dumped me) Tony decided to call me up and ask if he could take me out instead. He actually asked me to finish with my friend for him and come out with him instead! I should have realised then that I would spend the rest of my life doing everything for him.

I gave in, and we started dating, he had older friends who we started to mix with and they used to make fun of my age often asking if I had done my homework!. I was torn between my teen friends who I was used to hanging around with and this new man in my life who was introducing me to food and entertainment that I had never heard of. I was besotted and didn't really care about the fact that I didn't spend time clubbing and partying with my friends when I could be taken to fancy restaurants and being driven around in fancy cars with my new beau! 

It wasn't long, maybe a few months of dating, that Tony proposed to me. I was 16yrs old and very much in love, I didn't hesitate and remember thinking OMG of course I wanted to be married and have lots of babies. I was naive and in love (or so I thought) and when I told my parents I am sure they must have been shocked to say the least, but they were great and gave us their blessing. 

He was never the most romantic man (and still isn't!) and the proposal was not one that would probably go viral today on the internet, he just said:

"I am not sure what love is, but if its what I think it is I think I love you so maybe we should get married"

I said yes for the first time and you won't believe what happened next.... 

More to come in my next blog, everyone.