Sitting in the sun room of our south Charlotte home in 1992 trying to see the TV over a mountain of boxes, I never could have imagined that we were living the American Dream.

Those boxes marking the beginning of my wife’s business, Traditions, were moved long ago to a 5,500-square-foot shop at Park Road Shopping Center. What started as a hope and a whim has grown to become a successful business in furniture, accessories and interior design, one that defies the odds. In this fragile economy, in a world where chains and corporations rule, Traditions marks its 20th year in business this winter – owned by Sharon Garfield and operated with a passion spanning two decades.

Twenty years. I am awestruck, when I’m not busy sweeping the sidewalk in front of the shop.

You don’t watch your wife build a business from scratch without spending many a night negotiating who’s going to pick up the pizza for dinner. The journey has been winding, as it is for nearly every family business. It has taken us from our sun room to a spot in a remote office building to a small space in the back of Park Road Shopping Center where we could hear the child ballerinas dancing in the studio next door. Some days I’d keep the store and doze off reading a book. But Sharon wouldn’t stop. She kept investing time, money and creativity, eventually moving to the front of the amazingly busy Park Road Shopping Center, believing this is what the American Dream looks like:

Taking a chance. Putting your heart into a family business. Hiring employees who become family (so far we’ve had an engagement party and a baby shower at the shop). Answering to no one but yourself. (That explains Fern, the yellow lab/shop dog who sleeps by the front desk, and the after-hours glasses of wine to unwind.) Owning something that becomes, other than your kids, the mark you leave on this world.

Who can say why my wife has succeeded? Why does any family business rise or fall? So much of it is timing, luck, location and figuring out how to hold on in tough economic times that are beyond your control. All I know is what I have seen: My wife working to the depth of her soul. And those boxes in the sun room, the ones that were there at the start of this American Dream.

Ken Garfield