There’s a drawer in my apartment that could easily be mistaken for a tiny graveyard. Old phone chargers, buttons without their jackets, headphones with one ear dead, a watch that forgot how to tick. For years, I called it the “someday” drawer—the place where things too sentimental to toss but too broken to use went to sleep. I used to think I’d get around to fixing them one day, but honestly, I never really believed I would. They sat there, silent evidence of my habit of replacing instead of repairing.
And then one rainy afternoon, something shifted. I pulled out a lamp I’d loved but abandoned after its switch gave up. I don’t know what possessed me, but instead of letting it gather dust for another year, I decided I would fix it. Not call someone. Not drop it off somewhere. Just me, my two hands, and a screwdriver I hadn’t touched since moving in.
What surprised me wasn’t that I managed to get the lamp working again—it was that strange burst of joy, almost childlike, that came when the light flicked back on. It wasn’t just a bulb glowing; it was some hidden part of me lighting up too.
Fixing something myself doesn’t come naturally. I grew up in an era where “broken” was often shorthand for “time to buy a new one.” There’s convenience in that, yes, but it leaves you with a faint hollowness, like skipping the last few pages of a book and pretending you still read the ending. The object leaves your life unfinished. Repair, on the other hand, lets you close the loop.
The first time I stitched up a ripped seam in my favorite coat, I expected frustration, tangled thread, and an ugly scar of clumsy sewing. And sure enough, the stitches weren’t straight, the knot was bulky, and the repair was obvious if you looked too closely. But walking outside in that coat again felt different. It wasn’t just a piece of clothing anymore; it was something I had revived with my own hands, imperfect but alive. Every crooked stitch was proof that I’d tried instead of surrendering.
I’ve started noticing that the act of repairing something teaches patience in a way almost nothing else does. Fixing a drawer that squeaks demands you slow down and listen to its stubborn little complaint. Mending a ceramic cup forces you to align its cracks like puzzle pieces until they sit just right. There’s a rhythm to it—unscrewing, adjusting, tightening, testing—that mirrors the pulse of meditation. The world outside can be loud and relentless, but when I’m bent over some tiny object, coaxing it back to life, the noise falls away.
Of course, not everything I attempt ends in triumph. There was the kitchen chair I tried to glue back together, only to watch it collapse spectacularly when I sat down. Or the toaster that refused to heat no matter how many times I poked around inside it, probably because I had no business poking around inside a toaster in the first place. But even those failures carry a quiet dignity. The object may stay broken, but I no longer feel passive about it. I tried. I gave it a moment of my attention, a small act of respect before letting it go.
I think part of the satisfaction comes from how repairing collapses time. A broken thing often feels like a severed memory—you stop using it, you stop seeing it, and it begins to slip away from your daily life. When you bring it back, it’s like restoring a forgotten photograph to its frame. Fixing my old wristwatch wasn’t just about making it tick again; it reconnected me with the mornings I used to wear it, rushing out the door, glancing at its face instead of my phone. Repairing is not just practical—it’s strangely nostalgic.
There’s also something grounding about learning that not everything needs expertise or perfection. You don’t have to be a mechanic to tighten a bolt, or a seamstress to close up a rip, or an electrician to figure out why a lamp stopped working. So much of modern life pushes us toward outsourcing—apps to deliver food, services to assemble furniture, specialists to handle every inconvenience. Doing it yourself, even in small ways, feels like reclaiming a fragment of independence we didn’t realize we’d lost.
I once repaired a pair of old headphones by replacing the foam pads. The process took all of ten minutes, but the reward was disproportionate. When I slipped them back on, music sounded almost celebratory, as though the headphones themselves were relieved to be given another chance. Maybe that sounds absurd, but it felt like they had personality again, like they were no longer discarded ghosts but companions restored to their rightful role.
It also made me rethink how I treat other things in my life, even relationships. The instinct to throw away what’s cracked, to seek the shiny and new, doesn’t just apply to objects. Fixing things taught me that there’s beauty in tending to what’s worn instead of running from it. A conversation patched up after an argument, a friendship reinforced after drifting apart—these, too, carry the crooked but meaningful stitches of care.
Sometimes, when I look around my apartment now, I see little signs of my attempts at repair—a bookshelf propped up with an extra nail, a sweater with a scar of darker thread, a mug with a faint seam of glue. None of them are flawless, but together they create an environment that feels more lived-in, more mine. Perfection is sterile; repaired things are warm with the fingerprints of effort.
And yet, I still keep the “someday” drawer. It’s smaller now, more hopeful than grave-like. Whenever I open it, I don’t see failure anymore. I see potential projects, challenges waiting for the moment I feel ready to meet them. The drawer has become less about loss and more about anticipation.
Fixing things myself hasn’t turned me into some unstoppable DIY genius—I still outsource plenty, and I’m realistic about my limits. But the odd satisfaction lingers every time something broken becomes whole again under my hands. It feels like proof that not everything has to end the moment it falters. Sometimes, with a bit of patience and a screwdriver, there’s a second chapter waiting.
And maybe that’s what makes it so rewarding. Repair reminds me that imperfection doesn’t equal uselessness, that cracks can be closed, and that even a crooked stitch can hold more meaning than buying something pristine off a shelf. In a world obsessed with the new, I’ve found quiet joy in giving the old another chance to shine—one squeaky drawer, one stubborn lamp, one clumsy but heartfelt repair at a time.
