If It’s Broken, Why Replace It?

My husband is the soul of generosity to his family, his friends, and anyone who is in need. He lavishes gifts on me at Christmas and my birthday, makes no objections to shopping sprees I make for the grandchildren, and generously contributes to charities.

So why, oh why, is he so reluctant to replace broken items, insisting, "We can probably get some more use from it. We’ll make do"?

Almost 20 years ago we bought a top-of-the-line weed-whacker. It served us well for 10 years and then collected dust for seven years in the garage after it broke. When I would plead with him to trash it, he’d reply, "But it cost so much money."

He sorrowfully brought it to the dump three years ago when he accepted a new whacker for Father’s Day. "It was such a good tool," he commented sadly as he placed it gently on the garbage heap.

Before I replaced my kitchen stove the automatic ignitors failed, "That’s ok, that’s just for show. Just light with a match." The oven light ceased to work, "Purely a luxury item, the kitchen light will illuminate the inside." Finally, the door handle came off in my hand, "Nothing a little duct tape can’t handle."

On the memorable day it was replaced, I watched red-faced as the service man held the handle in his hand and dryly commented, "Ma’am, just how long have you had this stove?"

We owned a charcoal Webber grill for years and Russ was ready to get a new one when more charcoal fell through the holes in the bottom then stayed in the cooker. To his great joy he found one "like new" at a garage sale for only $2. "There’s not even holes in the bottom!" he crowed.

I was really wanting a gas grill since I am inept at starting fires but he prevailed because he had heard from a good friend that, "Charcoal meat tastes better."

Another three years passed until the new grill resembled the old. One spring as I swept the deck, my broom jolted the grill and it collapsed in a pile. The spindly legs had rusted off. Joyfully, I showed Russ and he commented, "We can put the grill up on cement blocks."

I won’t repeat my reply; just know that we bought a gas grill shortly after and have used it weekly for the last 2-1/2 years.

The lawn mower’s wheels started shifting positions after three years, so they were tied in place with reinforced nylon string. When the pull cord snapped two years later, a strong knot fixed it, but greatly shortened the pulling power to start. At year seven I would spend most of the morning attempting to start it. Since Russ could make it go after only four or five tries it was "obviously due to the wrong technique."

There did come the day that it refused to do anything. He sighed deeply, "I guess we will have to get a new one, but it was a good machine, wasn’t it?"

The time of replacement is speeding up though. Early on Christmas Eve the coffee maker failed and we had a house full of coffee drinkers for company. "Oh, no!" he cried.

"Nothing’s open, now what?" I asked calmly. (I could do this because I am not a coffee drinker.)

"Well, I can figure this out," he said.

And he did. He boiled the water on the stove and patiently poured it through the filter into the pot. It took roughly 10 minutes. He did that several times over the next two days, and after Christmas he bought a new coffee maker.

"I know you don’t drink it, and I only drink it on the weekends, but it’s good for when we have people over."

"Right," I replied, "and if you hadn’t bought it you’d have three more days of coffee duty."

"That too," he said.