The sun is shining today, but to call the past 30 days here in Pennsylvania “rainy” would be the understatement of the year. We were on track for record rain already, then Hurricane Irene hit, deluging us some more. Before anything could dry out, the remnants of Hurricane Lee swept through along with more normal late summer thunderstorms. We were fortunate to have no major water issues in our house, though several roads around here have been closed or are being repaired due to sinkholes and downed trees.
This past weekend, things appeared to be calming down, so we went to Lowe’s and bought a bunch of topsoil, rocks and grass seed. We started filling in the spots where everything had run off. This consumed a big chunk of Sunday afternoon to early evening. The weather forecast said there was a small chance of rain but…
Well, the small chance turned into a giant thunderstorm around 10PM. My husband and I stood there in the window with the flashlight, looking at the giant river cutting through our yard, washing all the topsoil, grass seed and fertilizer down into an already-well-fertilized and damp corner of the property.
I think this is a good image to keep in mind whenever I’m tempted to invest a lot of time and energy in home maintenance. Obviously, you want to take care of your property and possessions so things don’t fall apart before they need to. But there’s a certain futility in fighting much of entropy. The floor will just get dirty again. The toilets will need scrubbing again soon enough, so if you decide to go an extra day between cleanings, so what. The leaves will need to be raked, and if you have a zero tolerance level for weeds, you’ll never do anything but weeding. The amount of time you spend on all these things is a choice, and so if you are looking to put more time in your life, they are a good place to cut. At least until it stops raining so much.