Glamorously Stumbling through... Starting Again

I'm sitting in a rather uninspiring bar at Charles de Gaulle airport, with three hours to kill before my flight home from a supplier meeting. There's practically no internet, very little to do and, to make matters worse, I've just spent an unreasonable amount of time trying to get a glass of wine from a particularly grumpy Frenchman.

In the end, I resorted to shouting across the bar in my most convincing French accent. It worked. A little too well. He immediately launched into a full conversation with me in French, clearly under the impression that I was fluent. Now, considering I lived in France for five years when my children were younger, you might think this wouldn't be a problem. Wrong.

Could I remember what to say? No. Could I understand what the hell he was saying? Also no. So I did what I've become rather good at over the years. I smiled, nodded, laughed at what I hoped were the appropriate moments and pretended I knew exactly what was going on. And eventually, I got my wine.

Which, when I think about it, pretty much sums up how I've navigated quite a lot of life.

Anyway, with three hours to fill and no decent internet, I could have spent the time coming up with content ideas or working on the business. Instead, for some reason, I remembered a blog I'd started years ago.

Around the age of 46/47, I decided to document my life as I approached 50. I called it 'Glamorously stumbling to 50', created an instagram account @glamstumbler, and had every intention of writing about anything and everything in the lead up to the big 5-0.

I didn't get very far. Not long afterwards, my world was turned upside down and life became far too scary and chaotic to fit anything else in beyond surviving. And just to make things more difficult for myself, I decided to start a business.

What began as a little slogan tee and sweatshirt business ended up being responsible for keeping a roof over my children's heads and mine. Nearly ten years later, that little business has pivoted so many times it should probably be renamed The Magic Roundabout.

And here I am, approaching 57, thinking what better way to make my already busy life even busier than to start writing again. The irony is that I'm STILL stumbling around, trying to be glamorous, while navigating that wonderful mind and body changing gift to women everywhere. The menopause.

Somewhere along the way, I also lost a little bit of myself. When you're raising children, running a business and trying to keep everything together, it's easy to forget about the person underneath it all. But I've learnt an enormous amount in those years too.

I've learnt what I like, what works for me and what I'm no longer prepared to put up with. I've become more confident in my own style, more selective about what I spend my money on and considerably less interested in other people's opinions. And that has found its way into FWP. The clothes I design are a reflection of what I've learnt about getting dressed, feeling comfortable and still wanting to look bloody good. I'm not interested in following trends or dressing for my age. I just want to feel like myself.

My eldest has flown the nest, my youngest has started college, and for the first time in a long while, I can see a little more time opening up for me. I want to explore more, travel, eat wonderful food, drink good wine and try new things. Equally, I love being at home and doing absolutely nothing.

I'm embracing my grey hair, taking the electrolytes and wondering whether the collagen 

industry has finally lost its mind. I also seem to have a lot more opinions nowadays. So I thought, what better place to share them than on my own platform?

I live and breathe fashion, but beauty, travel and cooking are other passions of mine. Sometimes this will be a complete brain dump. Other times I'll want to share a brilliant serum, a fabulous pair of shoes, a recipe or something that has made me laugh. And occasionally, I might have something useful to say.

Does anyone actually care? I have absolutely no idea. But if sharing some of my experiences makes another woman laugh, feel a little more confident or realise she's not the only one making things up as she goes along, perhaps it's worth it.

And I suppose there's something else to be said for starting again. Or starting something completely new, for that matter. We can get so caught up in thinking we should have done things years ago that we forget there's absolutely nothing stopping us from doing them now. I'm nearly 57, and I'm picking up something I abandoned almost ten years ago. Why not? If there's something you've been meaning to do, perhaps it's time to give it a go. I mean, what's the worst that can happen?

And as I sit here in Paris airport, I should probably mention that ChatGPT isn't always right. Particularly when it comes to airport recommendations. For future reference, DO NOT go through security expecting a fabulous selection of shops, restaurants and bars at Terminal 2D. All you will get is a grumpy bartender who gives off a vibe of wishing he'd gone home hours ago.

Then again, had I not ended up in this rather boring bar, perhaps I wouldn't have remembered the blog at all.

So here we are. Glamorously Stumbling Through...

Still stumbling. Still trying to be glamorous.

Rae x