The Living Archive: Notes to My 94-Year-Old Self—E is for "Easy Fix"

E is for Easy Fix: A philosophy of proportionate response

Not every philosophy is inherited; some are improvised in the middle of the mess.

I’m not sure how it started—probably one of my early days of toddler-parent triage, milk pooling across the counter, toys underfoot, everything feeling a little more urgent than it really was. Something spilled, and before anything could escalate, out came the words before I could think them through: This is an easy fix.

Easy Fix.

A spontaneous utterance that tumbled out of my mouth immediately became a family rule, one of our guiding principles. Over the years, it’s become doctrine. If something breaks, if a mess appears, if someone forgets, drops, spills, or dents—before frustration can take hold, someone says, “Easy Fix!” Tone softens. Shoulders drop. Everyone exhales.

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My husband demonstrated the grace that underscores the “Easy Fix” mantra a few years ago, when he and our oldest were watching a Yankees game that was going south, when after a bad play, our son exclaimed “Oh come onnn!” and gestured so wildly that a bracelet he was wearing (a souvenir from a summer trip) went flying off his wrist and landed squarely in the middle of the television, shattering the screen into a million indecipherable pixels.

It was clear immediately that the TV was beyond repair.

My husband took a few breaths, composed himself, and reassured our by-then-inconsolable child that this was an Easy Fix (albeit an expensive one), and emphasized what we try to teach them: that things are replaceable, people are not.

It’s been powerful to see my children adopt this mantra for themselves and to see how they use it to take care of one another.

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I saw the true weight of that rule this past Christmas. I collect antique, hand‑blown glass ornaments—delicate, iridescent survivors of other people’s winters. Some I’ve acquired on trips, others were gifts from friends or family, but each one carries a quiet story of its own. A few are from my time studying abroad; another is a true family heirloom: a German ornament that belonged to my mother’s mother, more than a century old.

This year, while we trimmed the tree, which is always a cacophony of excited children, the inevitable happened. An over‑enthusiastic, buttery‑fingered six‑year‑old reached too far, and one of the special ornaments—one that shimmered with a bit of my past—hit the wood floor and shattered.

There was a wail, a frozen moment heavy with realization. And then—before tears could even fall—his older siblings stepped in.

“It’s okay,” they said softly. “This is an easy fix.”

One ran for the dustpan, another grabbed the vacuum. Within minutes, the shards were gone, and we kept decorating. The ornament was lost, but the philosophy held fast: things are replaceable; people are not.

As an exhausted working mother, it’s easy to get exasperated by the daily deluge of small disasters. But beneath the principle of “Easy Fix” lies a quiet kind of agency.

So much of life resists fixing—illness, grief, the wild unpredictability of the world itself. When gravity pulls at something fragile, we cannot stop it from falling, but we can decide what happens next: the temperature of the air, the timbre of our response.

An Easy Fix™ is not the same as a “quick fix.” It’s not flippant or dismissive; it’s deliberate. It’s the act of choosing calm over chaos, grace over reaction, a decision to keep things in proportion, and to keep panic at bay.

Try it and see: the next time something goes wrong, and your pulse starts to rise, ask yourself, “Is this an easy fix?”

If it is, exhale. Drop your shoulders. Carry on.

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Especially now, when the world feels incomprehensibly dark and uncertain, I find comfort in this small rule. There are still some problems that yield to gentle hands and steady breath.

May the world keep spinning, stubborn and beautiful, and may those who come after me inherit this simple creed: keep your worries in perspective, find peace in the solvable, and remember—the most important things in a home are the souls living within it.

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