We are in the midst of a large amount of “must-do” maintenance on the house.  We’ve got a plumber coming this afternoon, to work on an accumulation of minor problems that are beginning to add up to something major.  We’ve got the sprinkler repair man coming on Friday, to fix–again–the water pouring out of the main box each time we turn it on.  And we’re getting our gutters cleaned, before all the maple seeds begin sprouting in our eaves.

In the midst of all these plans, I heard a huge crash and clamor in our garage this morning.  I assumed the bike I’d hung up a few days before was no longer hanging; but no, it was the spring on our garage door.  One more call to one more person, for one more fix.

These are times where living more simply looks really appealing.  If we had a one story house, we could clean our own gutters.  If we didn’t have a garage, we wouldn’t have any doors to break.  If we didn’t have a sprinkler system, we wouldn’t need to prep it for winter and repair it constantly; though I admit I’m truly torn about the sprinklers.  I remember lugging hoses around our previous yard, in the heat of summer, while I was seven and eight months pregnant.  I thought this sprinkler system was a huge blessing for a long time.  I guess in this instance, living more simply would mean doing away with a yard completely.

It occurred to me recently, though, as I swept up dog hair for the umpteenth time:  no matter how much you strip down to the bare minimum, you’re still going to have stuff.  Assuming you’re not planning on joining the ranks of the homeless, you will always have a floor to sweep/vacuum/mop.  Even if you give away the majority of your excess clothing, you will always have laundry to keep up with.  You can do away with the large-scale upkeep by living in a maintenance-provided community, but you are still going to have a space to dust and clean and keep tidy.  (Well….I guess the clean part is optional.)

Stuff–at least some stuff–is completely unavoidable.  So I guess my plan is to do my best to ensure that my extraneous “stuff” remains minimal, to care for what I do have as well as I can (hence the incessant flow of repairmen over the next few days), and to enjoy what we do have as much as I can; to appreciate them as the blessings they are.  We were garageless for so very long that our garage, even with a broken door, is a huge blessing to me.  I love not scraping my windshield every winter morning.  I love having a place to store bikes, big wheels, and our blue bin.  I love not having to think about hailstorms damaging our cars.  So yes, broken door or broken sprinklers….I’m going to try to enjoy the stuff that I do have.  Because stuff is inevitable.