Page 82 - Sorry, We're Not Hiring Any Visionaries Today

SORRY, WE’RE NOT HIRING ANY VISIONARIES TODAY
all the people in my life, Ralph had the most influence on me. After my father died, he took over that role.
Ralph and I shared many times, but there is one particular event that he still reminds me of to this day. My brother was an avid collector of cigarette cards. When he was conscripted into the Air Force, I went into his bedroom one day and took the cards. I was ten years old at the time. In those days, my friends and I played a game where we flicked cards against a wall. If your card hap- pened to land on someone else’s cards, you’d take it. I wound up losing most of his cards playing this game.
But the story doesn’t end there. Ralph also collected rare pennies, and I took his collection to a toy store. When my mother found out what I had done, she freaked out and made me return to the store and return the toys. When she asked for the pennies back, the store manager shrugged. He handed her two one-pound notes. My brother was extremely angry with me. And never let me forget this story. He recently told me, “If I had kept the pennies, they would have been worth hundreds of thousands of dollars today!”
My mother was attractive, and people kept telling her, “You should find a man and get married again. You’ve got kids to take care of.” So she met this doctor, and they started dating.
I started working with my grandfather on the weekends to help out. That’s where I got my first start in fashion retailing.
I helped the women who’d come into the shop. They would try on jackets and coats. They found it pretty cute that a 10-year-old was helping out his grand- father in the store.
If there was one thing I took from my time at school, it was the importance of friendship. Finding people to communicate with on the same level is a vital piece of the puzzle. I learned the value of being on a team. I played a lot of soccer during my time in school. I scored a lot of goals, so people liked me. At one time, I thought about being a professional soccer player.
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