Have you ever met a person who knew exactly who they were and what they wanted from life? They knew their place in society and were content. Yes? So have I but I’m not one of them.
Throughout my life I’ve struggled to fit in, to find my place in the scheme of things. I tried so hard to be seen as ‘normal’. After school I went from one job to another, working in a factory, bar work, shops. All were just a way of bringing in money. But none were fulfilling, or what I really wanted to do.
Then around 1997 myself and my husband decided to start our own business. We became market traders selling metaphysical and new age products, which I had a personal interest in. To cut a long story short, I loved selling all those things, it felt right, but unfortunately the market wasn’t there and internet selling was still quite new so we gave up after a while and my husband went back to his work as a carpenter.
Fast forward 10 years or so. After another round of boring jobs; customer service, receptionist, even a clerk to the parish council. I finally found a job that I was comfortable in, when I opened a second hand book shop. Reading was one thing I loved and could do all day. I didn’t have to try to be somebody I wasn’t when I was absorbed in a book. Unfortunately it wasn’t meant to be and after 3 years the shop closed, due to lack of trade.
After being self employed again I didn’t want to go back to working for somebody else so I started making natural soap and skincare. Again, this was something I really enjoyed doing, I love working with natural ingredients and created some lovely balms and creams. I like working, and cooking, with herbs so that was the direction that I followed with my soaps and creams. I stopped making these a few years ago, because it just wasn’t making the money we needed, but it’s only a matter of time before I start again, as I miss it!
So a couple of years ago, when I realised the soap and skin care business wasn’t going to work, I started to try to figure out what I could try next, not an easy task given the fact that the only three jobs I have ever enjoyed were the market trading, the book shop and making the natural skin care products, all of which were self employed.
It was around this time that I realised after a long conversation with a friend, that I was a Pagan/Wiccan, some might even say a bit of a witch, something that until that moment I was unaware of, yet when I mentioned it to my husband, who knows me better than anyone, he coolly announced he had known that for a long time and it was just me who didn’t.
From that and some subsequent conversations, and after around six or seven months of research, the idea for Purple Raven was born, a business incorporating the metaphysical products which I have always liked, books on my new found passion, and lots of other goodies, quite a few of which are made by my husband, who as it turns out regards himself as a pagan.
This brings us full circle back to 1997 as we will be working together once again. Now all we both need is the figures and energy we both had back then.