My mom always says I have the mind of a mechanic, which I believe is largely a clever ploy meant to flatter me into repairing various simple objects (eyeglasses, a pen) when I come home to visit. Regardless, this repeated bit of positive reinforcement has given me an inflated sense of my talents. And so, one Sunday morning last month, I decided to install the Tushy bidet I’d received for Christmas.
According to the instruction booklet, installing the bidet is supposed to take under 10 minutes. In my case it took approximately 24 hours, and involved breaking the toilet entirely in the process.
Not that I was on my hands and knees working on installing the bidet the whole time! Some of the time I was going to the hardware store to buy WD-40 or a fourth wrench to add to my sprawling wrench collection. (How many wrenches is one supposed to have?) Sometimes I was lying on my bed, taking deep breaths and meditating on why things that come so easily to other people seem to be so hard for me, such as installing bidets or finding a life partner or reliably opening my mail. Sometimes I was putting a cooling bag of frozen peas on the blister that I had developed on my hand after an hour of trying to the screw that connected the water pipe to the toilet tank.
But mostly I really was on my bathroom floor: watching plumbers explain how toilet tanks work on YouTube; emailing with Tushy customer service workers who kept sending me frowny-face emojis to convey how sad and unusual my situation was; FaceTiming with various friends and family members on the off-chance they had heretofore unmentioned plumbing abilities.
In short, I lost my mind during this 24-hour period. But also: I was growing.
The thing about doing home repairs is that it’s very frustrating, which is perhaps why so many people put them off for so long. My dad is notoriously delinquent on home projects. After months of begging from my mom, last year he finally tried to install a towel rack in the guest bathroom, which does not work and merely protrudes from the wall in a slumping fashion as if burdened by the boondoggle of embarking on what seems like a straightforward task and the twists and turns it takes.
But I also think that taking on home repair projects that stretch me beyond my actual abilities is good for me, because it makes me appreciate the work that goes into daily life, even the things that aren’t that great. The beer I had last night? Someone had to go through endless iterations experimenting with hops and fruit and fermentation, just to get it to the level of “acceptable.” The dumb movie I watched on Hulu? Hundreds of people still spent a lot of time and energy writing and acting and editing and shooting and producing that utterly forgettable rom-com, and truly, good for them! I’ve never done it!
Honestly, almost nothing is consistently and universally easy to do. Lots of people have trouble sleeping, and that’s one of the least demanding activities in which we can possibly partake.
There were many points in the Tushy bidet installation process in which I felt tired, hopeless, and ready to give up, and in my life I have indeed given up on a great many things. But I did not give up on the bidet. I persevered, even when I accidentally sprayed myself with water multiple times, even when there was water all over the floor, even when the toilet tank stopped refilling entirely and I wound up having to go to to not one but two coffee shops to use their bathroom in the morning (the first coffee shop’s bathroom was staff-only). And in the course of things, I remembered that persevering feels good, even (especially?) when it’s about something stupid.
“You are responsible for your own happiness,” the yoga teacher I watch on YouTube said the other day, and while I don’t normally go in for yoga-speak, her words really stuck with me. Over the past few years, I’ve often felt as if I don’t have a lot of control of my life; I try to pursue things that I think will make me happy, and they don’t happen at all. But no matter what, there are some things I can still make happen. Like installing a bidet; like sending this newsletter to you.