Hem pants. Replace buttons. Re-hang shelves and pictures. Fix holes in screens. Weed garden. (Ignore crabgrass.) Deadhead annuals. Scrub enamel sink. Re-plant pachysandra bed. Adjust bike seats. Touch up dinged paint in hall. Oil squeaking hinge. Darn moth holes in favorite sweater, black. Launder curtains, and vacuum louvered blinds. Prune files. Treat stains. Find missing pieces. Sweep up glass, and — band-aid solution — cover broken pane with a cardboard rectangle. Proofread the syllabus, the assignment, the handout. Adjust temperature. Change sheets. Plane doors. Bring broken chairs to Manny; wait two weeks; pick up chairs from Manny. Glue tiny porcelain arm to tiny porcelain shoulder.
Take old desk and make it new.
So much of time seems filled with repairing, maintaining, and renewing what’s already been done. The moments of decision and creation — when life is composed — are few.
leaf stitch word 
There’s a term in Hebrew, tikkun olam, that may be relevant here. It translates, roughly, into repairing the world. Is there a difference between creating and repairing? The world is here already. We don’t need to make the world. Maybe what we’re here for is to fix it.
Your view is slowly becoming a rare one–we are now a throway “upgrade” culture. (new Iphone, gotta have it. Have an IPOD, well it isn’t good enough, get a video one) I’m happy you don’t subscribe to that (less is more, giveaway what you don’t need (see Shoes in Driveway), and repair what is broken. It’s also lovely to see what your own hands can do.
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Grateful for sharing thiis