The Flea Market

I arrived home after my first foray into the world of retail trade ie my stall at a local flea market (see previous blog when I decided to hang up my Marigolds) to a sea of expectant faces.

'Hiya, mum,' my son said. 'How did it go?'

'Well. I didn't sell anything, but I do know how to break a man's foot.'

Which I think, on reflection, is quite a useful piece of knowledge.

It all started when I arrived at the local flea market to sell my wares. My wares being carefully sourced Fairtrade recycled jewellery and other Fair trade items. All this in a bid to escape the horrors of cleaning for a living and help my fellow man while I'm doing it.

I set up my stall and I must say for a first attempt it was pretty good. My prices were okay, too. The fella at the next stall said so.

There were quite a few stalls. Wooden carvings, herbal concoctions, handmade jewellery and cards and so on. It was really quite colourful. The lady opposite was from Austria. The woman on the right a university lecturer who bottled home made olive oil and herbs in her spare time and the fella on my left who was also selling Fair Trade, only lotions and body creams etc. I thought we rather complmented each other.

Three of us were jokingly called 'flea market virgins' and generally everyone was nice to each other. But it was a hot day and the pros soon concluded everyone had gone to the beach. Who wanted to trail around a stuffy hall looking at paintings, tomato plants and home made vegetarian rissoles when they could be on the beach???

In our boredom the fella next to me shared his Maltesers, which I thought was very nice of him. Then he shared his smokey bacon crisps. And then we got talking. Turned out he used to be a 'bouncer' and knew a few moves. So he taught me how to duck a punch (should the event ever occur) and how to get out of a strangle hold if my attacker came from behind hence and that's how I learnt the 'foot break' move.

So whilst my first step into market trading was a bit of a damp squib. Any would-be-mugger had better watch out. Not a complete disaster after all, then.