Von Maur

Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment. -Rumi

When I muse on poetry about love, somewhere high in my memory are works by the 13th century mystic poet Rumi. What visceral, spiritual love - one can see why Sufism sprang from his sometimes ecstatic thought. I think of this Muslim writer in the days before Valentine's Day - a holiday celebrating a more romantic European era of love - and I realize that's a different topic.

If a person wanted find a memorable gift or simply have a comforting shopping experience on February 11th or so, I would highly recommend Von Maur at Jefferson Pointe in Ft. Wayne. At the intersection of Illinois Road and West Jefferson, Von Maur is a place to take your wife, daughter, mother, mother-in-law or grandmother. It's old-school department store with plush chairs and luxurious bathrooms, never crowded, and just very nice. Seated at the grand piano under the escalator, a polished young man was passionately playing, and there was hardly a lull while I was there as he transitioned from classical sonatas to Seal and back.

Flowers and candy are wonderful for Valentine's Day, but letting her pick out something nice from Von Maur that would last for years - not bad either. I do not have a collection, but I have a personal weakness for browsing through the designer hand bags - and here lies the best collection I've seen in Ft. Wayne, with the possible exception of Macy's. They are just better laid out at Von Maur, somehow. A good bag in a soft-to-the-touch leather or fabric, clean bold lines and streamlined designs - that's real luxury. You look rich and put-together with a nice bag like that. I love the spring bright colors, but I can't carry off something like that seasonally yet, so I move on to accessories.

Here I pick out this year's Valentine to myself - A very wide yet simple, designer leather belt that I can wear to cinch a sweater dress I have - I've been looking for one of these, it's the accessory of the year and I don't have one. To do this right, avoid large buttons or other funkiness that would draw unnecessary attention to that area. I'm happy, I've been wanting something like this.

It's a great store - beautiful shoes, men's clothing, jewelry, well-made bathing suits that are sold not just seasonally - and high-end casual stuff for women. I do splurge here today on a couple of cosmetics items - Clinique black mascara and their 'dramatically different' moisturizing lotion. This is not the only brand of cosmetics I use, but I'll talk about others later, and it's all I'm buying today.

When I leave, I complete this trip to Jefferson Pointe with a stop by Starbucks. I have a personal rule to always make coffee at home and not buy it out. However, I have an empty bag of ground Starbucks we buy in the grocery store to make at home - and when the bag is empty you can take it to Starbucks for a free coffee. Thus, a free caffeine splurge for me on a cold day. La Dulce vita, baby!