One of the most most direct ways an average person can reduce his impact on the environment is by fixing things rather than replacing them. But businesses have convinced us that it’s more sensible to throw things away and buy new ones. Repairing is too hard, and you have to have a special knack or training.
Rubbish. Of course it’s just as good environmentally to pay someone else to fix things for you, but any sufficiently stubborn cuss can fix anything. And fixing things comes with satisfaction that you just don’t get by handing over your credit card. Up until roughly our parents’ generation nearly everyone routinely fixed stuff, whether it was darning a sock or mending a fence. You just have to be optimistic.
These thoughts occurred to me when I was replacing the broken radio on my 2003 Honda. I sometimes have to drive long distances; I missed having a radio so I decided to replace it, a process that involves dismantling the center console as you can see in the image to the right.
This picture was taken was a point I find that comes in many repair projects: a moment of doubt that shows up just when undoing what you’ve done is about to become more trouble than continuing. I was sitting amid bits of car and feeling my confidence flagging, when I thought to myself, This is ridiculous. The whole thing has been reasonably easy so far. The worst that’s going to happen is a little cosmetic damage to a 13 year-old jalopy.
While of course I wouldn’t throw away a car just because it had a bad radio, it’s actually that moment of doubt I wanted to talk about. That feeling, often unspoken, derails many good intentions. You end up throwing the thing out, or putting it up in the attic which amounts to the same thing. But since throwing things out is always an option, why let doubt deter you? And if you aren’t sure how to start, with 1.3 billion videos on YouTube, you can nearly always find videos of other people doing the exact same repair.
As it turned out, the worst part of the project was already over: since the car was so old some parts were stuck together with age and broke. If you look closely in the first picture, below the defroster button in the lower right of the climate controls you’ll see a plastic bit that was ripped away be a clip that wouldn’t unsnap. When I noticed that I was dismayed, but it turned out to be meaningless: everything came back together quickly and fit nice and snug as you can see in the bottom photo.
And that’s another thing that happens in just about every non-trivial repair project: setbacks. Old parts are stuck, new parts don’t fit, you break things, or paint yourself into a corner. But if you persevere you can overcome any setback. Often things aren’t as bad they appear.
Not only does repairing things help the environment and save you money, I see it as reclaiming a birthright, a legacy of resilience handed down through seven thousand generations of resourceful, mule-headed ancestors, from our grandparents all the way back to the first person who banged two rocks together.
So here’s the idea: let’s encourage each other to reuse rather than replace by sharing our repair experiences and questions.
What have you been working on? Are there things you’ve been thinking about fixing but don't know how? Or are you stuck in one of your current projects? If you need help or think you can help other people, let’s hear from you.