The One Little Repair That Ate My Entire Weekend

It started with a loose cabinet handle.

That was it.

One tiny, slightly wobbly handle on one perfectly functional kitchen cabinet. A normal person would have tightened the screw and continued living a peaceful life.

I am apparently not a normal person.

Saturday morning, I grabbed a screwdriver and announced, “This will take two minutes.”

Those words should legally require a permit.

I tightened the screw. The handle was still loose.

“No problem,” I said, because optimism had not yet been beaten out of me.

I removed the handle and discovered the screw hole had become too large. Fine. I knew a trick. Toothpicks and wood glue.

Unfortunately, the wood glue was in the basement.

While looking for it, I noticed the basement light flickering.

“Well, that’s annoying.”

I changed the bulb.

Still flickering.

Naturally, this meant I spent twenty minutes standing beneath it flipping the switch on and off like I was attempting to communicate with the dead.

Eventually I decided the fixture probably needed replacing.

Back upstairs, I remembered I was supposed to be fixing a cabinet.

Except now I couldn’t find the screwdriver.

I checked the counter.

Nothing.

The table.

Nothing.

The basement.

Nothing.

I spent fifteen minutes looking for it before discovering it in my back pocket.

Excellent.

At this point I decided I needed a trip to the hardware store for wood glue and possibly a new light fixture.

Hardware stores are dangerous because you walk in needing a $6 bottle of glue and leave convinced you’re capable of building a deck.

Forty-seven minutes later, I returned home with wood glue, a light fixture, drywall anchors, a level, a package of screws, two paintbrushes, weather stripping and a small potted plant.

I have absolutely no explanation for the plant.

I repaired the cabinet handle.

Success.

I should have stopped.

Instead, I stood back and noticed the cabinet door was slightly crooked.

“Well, while I’m here…”

Never say that.

Twenty minutes later, the cabinet door was no longer crooked because it was no longer attached to the cabinet.

I stared at it lying on the kitchen floor.

The cabinet stared back at me.

We had reached an impasse.

Apparently one hinge screw had been stripped, which meant I now needed to repair that hole too.

While crouched on the floor, I noticed the baseboard beside the cabinet had separated slightly from the wall.

“Oh, for God’s sake.”

I pushed it.

It moved.

I pushed it again because apparently I needed confirmation.

Still moved.

So I grabbed a hammer.

This was the moment the situation officially deteriorated.

I tapped the baseboard back into place.

Unfortunately, my definition of “tap” and the wall’s definition of “tap” were different.

A small piece of paint chipped off.

Fine.

I had leftover paint in the garage.

I found the paint.

I opened it.

It had transformed into something resembling cottage cheese.

Back to the hardware store.

The same cashier was working.

“You’re back.”

There was judgment in her voice.

“I’ve expanded the project.”

She nodded slowly.

She had seen my kind before.

I returned with paint, primer, another brush, wood filler and—somehow—a bird feeder.

Again, I cannot explain these purchases.

I patched the chipped paint.

Unfortunately, the fresh paint made the rest of the wall look dirty.

So obviously I painted the entire wall.

Halfway through, I moved the refrigerator slightly to reach behind it.

That is when I discovered The Thing.

Nobody knows what The Thing was.

It may once have been food.

It may have been part of a vegetable.

It may have achieved consciousness.

I disposed of it without making eye contact.

Then I noticed the refrigerator water line had a tiny drip.

At 9:14 Saturday night, I was lying on my kitchen floor holding a flashlight in my mouth while watching a YouTube video called “EASY Refrigerator Water Line Repair — Five Minutes!”

The man in the video was a liar.

His refrigerator was clean.

His tools were organized.

Nothing he touched immediately broke.

I hated him.

By Sunday morning, my kitchen looked like it had been searched by federal investigators.

The cabinet door was leaning against a chair. Paint supplies covered the table. The refrigerator was six inches from the wall. The baseboard was partially removed. There were screws everywhere.

But the original cabinet handle?

Perfectly tight.

I considered this a victory.

Then I remembered the basement light.

Right.

The light fixture.

I shut off the breaker and removed the old fixture.

Behind it was a mysterious collection of wires installed sometime during an era when electrical codes apparently consisted of “Eh, that’ll probably work.”

I stared at them.

They stared at me.

I put the old fixture back.

Some repairs are between the house and God.

By Sunday afternoon, I had reattached the cabinet door, painted the wall, fixed the baseboard, repaired the refrigerator line and pushed the refrigerator back into place.

I stood in the kitchen admiring my work.

Honestly?

It looked pretty good.

I had survived.

I had conquered homeownership.

I had become one with the hammer.

Then I heard it.

Drip.

I froze.

Drip.

No.

Absolutely not.

Drip.

I followed the sound.

Kitchen sink?

Dry.

Refrigerator?

Dry.

Bathroom?

Dry.

Then I looked up.

There was a tiny wet spot forming on the ceiling.

I stared at it for a long time.

The wet spot stared back.

Finally, I turned off the kitchen light, walked into the living room, opened a bag of chips and sat down.

The ceiling could leak.

The basement light could flicker.

The cabinet could fall off the wall.

At this point, the house could develop legs and walk directly into Lake Ontario.

I was done.

On Monday morning, a coworker asked what I’d done over the weekend.

“Home repairs.”

“Oh nice! What did you fix?”

I thought about the cabinet. The wall. The refrigerator. The baseboard. The electrical fixture I had wisely surrendered to. The mysterious ceiling leak. My three hardware-store trips. The inexplicable plant and bird feeder.

Then I remembered how this entire nightmare had begun.

“A cabinet handle.”

She looked confused.

I nodded.

“It’s been a difficult time for the family.”

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