Janne McKay has never had a resume. She never needed one. When you go straight to the top, there are no managers to answer to or to try to impress. When your first job out of school is running the business you created, doing the work you are called to do, there is never much need to apply, sit through a job interview, or negotiate a pay raise.
Mrs McKay and her husband David are that rare thing - the self-made professional - and after 50 years of business in Newcastle, they are set to retire this week.
"I love it, but it is time for us to stop," Mrs McKay said on Friday afternoon, between serving customers who drifted in and out as the last of their stock was sold.
The Jewellery Affair at The Junction will close its doors for the last time on Saturday, October 25.
For the last five decades, since they met and fell in love in high school, Mr and Mrs McKay knew they would make their hay in the jewellery business. Mrs McKay had a flair for design, and her husband had a watchmaker apprenticeship. It was a match that fit together as cleanly as a well-cut gear.
They went into business together and ran three stores in the course of their careers in The Junction. Children followed and grew up locally, working around the city. The neighbourhood changed with the times, and so did the trade. Laboratory-grown diamonds started to replace the mined variety, as well as the shape and style of the cut.
When a customer walks into the store, Mrs McKay sizes them up to find the piece that suits them best. She considers where they work, whether they play sports and preferences for style.
"You listen to them and look at them," she said. "You tap into who they are. You get it - if you don't get it, you wouldn't be doing it."
Mr McKay spends his time in his workshop, fixing watches - a rare trade now - and manufacturing the pieces sold at the front of house. As the steady flow of customers came and went on Friday afternoon, a man in a workers shirt and boots came in and asked if Mr McKay was selling his tools as he retires, but the watchmaker would never part with them.
Vintage timepieces have come back into vogue, Mrs McKay says, and the prospect of having a neighbourhood watchmaker who can repair and maintain them has been a rare thing.
"They love vintage watches, and watches handed down through families mean a lot," Mrs McKay says. "There's no apprentices for watchmaking anymore."
Asked about how they have managed their long-tenured partnership, Mrs McKay says they have both had their corners of the shop to call their own.
"He's in the workshop, and I'm in the front, running the business," she said. "We just do it. We'll find out later how it will go when we've retired. It's all good - we have three great children who have grown up in the area and have good careers."
Mrs McKay says her commitment to her design and art work will continue, but retirement is her opportunity to take the job on her terms no more 40-hour weeks.
Mr and Mrs McKay say they plan to continue living in Newcastle after they close the business over the weekend when two of their three children have also settled.
"We love it," she said. "We absolutely love it."
