"There was a time in my life when I had nice bedding." Such a country lust pattern that turns every lottery camp into a Scandinavian hygge zone. But I can't get it anymore. Because it is in the bottom drawer of my chest of drawers and it won't open. I also know why: The bulging bottom of the middle protrudes into it because it has worn the other half of the bed covers for years. These are the ones with the broken zippers and the torn off buttons. There is nothing you can do about it. Or is it?
My life as an everyday Buddhist
I've moved about ten times in my life. That made me an everyday Buddhist. The main tenets of this belief can be summarized as follows: "Everything earthly is doomed to decline. Because, behold, your chests of drawers and halogen lamps, your stoves and freezers are just going ahead. Embrace the blemish, let go, smile." I used to live with it when it got darker in the kitchen. Because I didn't know how to replace the bulbs in the light bar over the worktop. The fact that food was coated with more than one side dish. Because I was too stingy to call an electrician to fix my two broken stoves. Everything works. I give the defective elements a nickname instead of annoying them. This helps. My linen chest of drawers is called Trulleberg, after the piece of furniture from the Loriot classic "Ödipussi". Even with that you couldn't open a certain drawer, you had to shake it open. Since I know a man with beautiful brown eyes, spirit level and cordless drill (moving house: two), the area around me has decreased.
Even the woman is … right?
He likes to quickly remove what he sees. For that I fell for years into what psychologists call "learned helplessness": Why exercise my two left hands when he is tidy with his two right hands? As for our Trulleberg: You could stick the sagging drawer bottom, for example, in the notch on the back wall. Just have to do someone. Suddenly my fighting spirit wakes up and shows me a bird. Yes, where are we to always call for the husband instead of lending a hand? What decade do we actually live in?
On the way to the hardware store, I still have pictures in my mind, in which people are ecstatic pushing themselves at self-made garden sheds at dawn, drunk with self-efficacy. But then I stroll through the rows of shelves and feel ashamed. Why do you need rasps and countersinks, universal angles or hole saws? What is a flexible duct system composed of flexible hoses, what is a built-in rocker switch, and maybe I need that to optimize the drawer? Obviously I have no idea what holds the world together.
Step by step
I approach a shelf with glue and glue, respectful as a herd of wild animals. Courage, the tubs and jars don't bite. I choose the turbo wood glue for 6.99 euros, ashamed of the mismatch between the size of the product (XS) and the dimension of my plan (XXL). After all, I understand the instructions for use: apply thinly, press surfaces together for 30 to 60 seconds.
At home, you have to say it so clearly: a miracle. The complex gluing process works perfectly. As my work hardens on newspaper on the floor, a wave of "Yes, we can" feeling floods me. Why not take advantage of the waiting time and reattach the clips that have been torn out for a while to the bedroom curtains? When I'm at it, I immediately remove the finger pinch protection from my bedside table. Who needs child protection if one child gets breasts and the other soon beard? And why does the man with the deer eyes have screwdrivers in all sizes and colors? Then I hammer a framed photo on the wall lying around on the Trulleberg. Gross project duration: around eight months. Project duration net: about eight minutes. In the end I make the bed with my favorite laundry. It is now accessible again. From now on, I won't let myself be held down by unruly matter. Or skilled guys. I swear.
"Everyday Buddhism, the first: embrace the blemish and smile!"
When I put the drawer back on its guide rail, it looks suspiciously loose. I ignore that. But as I put the first stack of laundry in, the bottom comes loose from the front. Yikes He has never done that before. And then the front part of the right side wall. This is also new. After all, the back holds. I learn: getting rid of quirks in your own four walls is like tying down a too narrow fitted sheet on a mattress that is too wide. If you have the fourth tip on it, the first jumps off again.
This applies to both small and large. The man with the cordless drill recently did the trick of repainting our apartment after ten years – extremely full four and a half rooms with high ceilings. But since then, the wooden baseboards have been uncomfortably eye-catching. Because after ten years of bobby car races and other children's games they peeled off miserably. In order to grind and paint them, you would have to dismantle all floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. My suggestion to simply paint over it, and only where the paint is really off, does not meet with enthusiasm. All or nothing. I think of Sisyphus, who rolls a boulder up the mountain every day. Who says you have to think of him as a happy person?
So I heaved the drawer out of the Trulleberg again and repeated the adhesive game on the front. The tub gives off its last content with an old-fashioned thump. I press firmly, then I thoroughly punch in the place where the wooden pins connect the front and side parts. They don't want to fit properly anymore. But what are a few millimeters between friends? Didn't engineers misjudge a few years ago when building a tunnel that the input and output tubes ended up being seven meters apart?
DIY – but sustainable
As I consider helping out with the hammer, the redeeming thought comes to me. Another level on the Buddhist knowledge scale. First: I am a cool sock and our apartment is a total trend piece. Others spend heaps of money on tables and chairs in shabby chic, which are stained with black tea and trimmed to age. We do it ourselves. DIY style, but sustainable: wear out our drawers, drive the baseboards to mischief, and our curtains work by themselves as if a rock band had clung to the gang bang. All that for zero euros.
Second, yes, you could fix everything. Systematic, not just somehow. But do I want an environment in which furniture and decoration are more perfect than yourself? It is no accident that the slightly damaged parts have nicknames. Because they also have character. You just have to know how to deal with them. Just like with lovely and at the same time somewhat whimsical older women. Still better than all the inconspicuous, customized everyday items that work smoothly and still look like new after years. Philistine!
My middle drawer is now back in the chest of drawers, it no longer blocks the lower one, and it has been rearranged. To open it is better to pull the metal handle on the left, to push it in, press to the right to compensate, then the side and front parts stay together. So: largely. Everything goes with feeling. I just have to explain that to my husband.
Verena Carl once put together a cupboard, 1990. Unfortunately, she had to lean the sliding doors into the frame because the rails pointed to the rear wall.
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