Fixing things that are broken

I just fixed two items in my home that broke during a house party. I usually don’t like stuff, objects -at lest not owning them, it makes me feel rooted, stuck, fixed. Owning material objects makes me inflexible, gives a feeling of (unwanted) responsibility and it also adds a bit of guilt.

But I find a strange consolidation in putting material objects back together – fixing them.

I can really understand why people choose to work in the repair business. It got this very attractive simplicity to it, the pleasant satisfaction you get from the process of putting thing right.

It’s not so easy with people – when they break its much more complicated to fix.

First of all it’s very hard to tell if someone is broken, it’s not always visible on the outside.

Secondly it’s not clear what “fixed” should look like, which are the characteristics of an undamaged person?

Aren’t the guiding principles for “undamaged” just a normative statement by the currently dominant view within a society? And what evidence do we have that these principles themselves aren’t responsible for our brokenness? The history reveals that the description of sound and sane isn’t static or universal in any way. It seems to me as a highly arbitrary construction….sane, healthy, sound, happy…

Third, How do you mend a broken person? Since we can’t with certainty discern the characteristics of an undamaged person, it’s hard to come up with a remedy for a broken one. Without a destination it’s hard to set the course of action…

But people still break. Everyday.
break them selves.
break others.
get broken….

It breaks my heart.

And we don’t know how to fix it.

The closest thing I found that even resembles some kind of remedy for a broken person is a hug and/or a friendly word.

But it’s not a fix…it’s more like a temporary band-aid to stop the bleeding…

Material objects are sympathetic in that way - they are easy to fix.