When the Going Gets Tough…

The 2026 season on Marco Island and Naples proper is now officially in full-blown mode. The shop broke jewelry and diamond sales records both in December and January, thanks to my daughter Lindsay (aka The Jeweler’s Daughter). It’s currently running like a finely oiled machine. For many years, we tended to butt heads about what the future will be like in this industry, mostly about what to buy for our clientele and what not to! I’m old school, Lindsay is far from it; she loves trying new styles and trends and everything about the business. She started as a teenager cleaning (reluctantly) and arranging jewelry in the windows and showcases. Before I knew it, she was picking out loose diamonds and precious gemstones, buying stock jewelry for the shop, and designing and creating unusually wonderful wearable pieces in all precious metals. Lindsay has done the time in the biz and she has years and years of experience and knowledge. That said, we still continue to butt heads for over twenty years, and I have come to the conclusion that hers is harder than mine. When the dust settles, she usually gets her way.

While I’m still technically the boss, my customers, after 31 years, have accepted her as the go-to person at 680 Bald Eagle Drive. Presently, I come and go as I please, sort of. I’m feeling like an old relic from the past, sometimes feeling like I’m almost in the way. One busy day, Lindsay made a comment that pretty much inferred that it would be easier if I would be somewhere else other than here? So…her wish was my command; will a mere 6,565 miles away be adequate, dear?

My distant destination last month was Cairo, Egypt. My childhood dream had finally come true, leisurely cruising with my wife and friends down the ancient River Nile! As a kid in the 1960s, I spent hours in the ancient Egyptian exhibits at The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, amazed and bewildered by the intricate craftsmanship of the ancient goldsmiths.

I got to become amazed and bewildered once again, especially after I attended the new billion dollar Grand Egyptian Museum that just opened this November in Cairo, only a short distance from The Great Pyramids. Every single artifact that was found in King Tutankhamun's un-plundered tomb by Howard Carter in 1922 was on display…You want to talk about mesmerizing! A person could spend a week in that museum and not see everything!

I observed showcase after showcase of young Tut’s royal treasure that includes piece after piece of his priceless gold jewelry…it’s good to be king!

The trip involved airplanes, cars, three-wheeled carts, buses, boats, balloons, and a camel as a means of transportation in this nation. Just observing people driving in Egypt is a lesson in organized chaos! If you thought the Jamaicans or Italians drive insanely, I can tell you the Egyptians have them beat by a desert mile; they have no conception of staying in painted lanes, let alone observing traffic lights. Heck, the off-ramps have no visible signage! I noticed a bumper sticker that read “My driving scares me too!!”

The rest of the trip went from port to port on the Nile, such as Saqqara, Beni Hasan, Asyut, Luxor (ancient Thebes), Karnak, and Edfu… Whew! To name a few! These centuries-old river cities are where all the important sites for temples and ancient monuments are located. Some sites were over 4,500 years old; they made me feel young! Shopping in the many outdoor markets was a daunting experience; the street vendors are very aggressive and many refuse to take no as an answer. We were fortunate to have our tour guide, “Queen Randa,” bark at them effectively, keeping them at bay, and boy oh boy could she ever scold them in Arabic.

We visited “rug schools “in Saqqara, where kids as young as six learn the ancient practice of making cotton and silk rugs from scratch and attend grade school all in the same day. I’ll cherish the small rug I purchased there; their skill at this tender age was spectacular. From there, we took a short bus ride to a papyrus factory using the ancient art of making “paper” for writing hieroglyphs and wonderful paintings. The high point was the up, up, and away ballooning experience over the many tombs in the Valley of the Kings in Luxor. My wife and I were hesitant on this dicey excursion after seeing how the Egyptian drove wheeled vehicles. Once off the ground and after my heart settled back in my chest, the bird’s eye views over the vast Sahara desert were an exhilarating experience; the balloon pilot’s skill was impressive despite landing in some poor farmer’s banana farm - the observing field workers, water buffaloes, and donkeys were not the least bit impressed! All in all it was a wonderful and memorable whirlwind trip, and simultaneously, I was able to stay out of my daughter’s hair for a couple of weeks.