It Never Ends.

Today I am having my Air Conditioner replaced. Another $3,500. I am now past the $20,000 mark on repairs to this house that was sold as if in livable condition. I count myself incredibly fortunate that I have had the resources necessary (with a little help from my insurance company and my mom) to make the needed repairs. I don’t know when they’ll be done. It’s not yet. I still have to fix the floors and sheet rock from the roof leak. That will probably be a couple more grand.

It’s frustrating, and it never seems to end. But this is where I am in my life. The big middle. I work. I maintain. I improve. Wealth is created through labor. This is true of personal financial wealth. It is true of spiritual wealth. It is true of the wealth of body we enjoy when we are fit and healthy. Obviously, labor is not the only source, but it is a significant one, and it is the only one that is under my own ability to control.

By doing all these repairs on my home, it will be worth more when I sell it in a few years. By working and establishing my name and my expertise, I will make myself more valuable in my career. But continuing to improve my diet and my physical condition, I will be preserving my health into my later years. My practicing my program in Alcoholics Anonymous, I am able to maintain my remission and spiritual fitness so that my perspective stays appropriately reasonable and my spirit remains serene. Such as I can.

I have a tattoo that says “Strength and Courage”. And I have a tattoo that says “Serenity and Wisdom”. I need another that says “Acceptance”. Resentment, lamentation, and rage do me no good. I am angry about my house. I was mislead, and I believe defrauded. But I can get no recompense. The sellers have plausible deniability on everything, and so I settled with them for a pittance rather than waste everyone’s money on lawyers. I accept that and I’m going to be ok.

Friday, when I learned I needed a new air conditioner, I just laughed. I’m putting in a Lennox. Compressor and coils. Replacing the piece of garbage that the place came with. A brand that apparently everyone knows is garbage but my inspector never saw fit to mention. The furnace is the same brand, and I will probably have to replace it soon enough. For now, it works. And if I have to replace it, I’ll have it done right and then I’ll have a house with a high quality HVAC system to sell when I sell it.

It never ends. And that’s a good thing. I am in a constant battle with my own entropy. I labor to improve myself and my surroundings. It costs time and it costs effort and it costs money. I’m fortunate that I have the ability to muster those things. And my ability to muster those things is in part a result of the labor I did earlier in my life (along with many other factors, including many privileges I was born with).

I’ve heard many times that if we’re not moving forward, we’re moving backwards. I think that’s nonsense. Standing still can require enormous efforts. Discipline. And labor, to defeat entropy and maintain a stillness of space worth inhabiting. Standing still can be revolutionary act in world determined to race from conclusion to conclusion. I will stand and contemplate. I will build a small place where I can breathe slowly.

In this moment, I am here. I have worked hard for here. So I will stand still in this place.