Now, This Is a Change I Can Handle

Sometimes the "key" to self-care has a little "twist."

I bought myself a little something this week. I thought about getting a pedicure and treating myself to a froufrou coffee and gluten-free donut. But I decided to get something lasting. Something that benefits me every day.

Door knobs. Actually, door levers.

Yes. I went to the home improvement store and purchased new door levers for the main floor.

Photo by David Lezcano on Unsplash

Parts of our home were built the year Nixon and Ford were born. Yeah, well over a century ago. Other parts are more mid-century (but not modern—more midcentury postmodern repulsive). And still more were added in the years of shag carpet and wood paneling.

We’ve lived in this home for nineteen years now, and we’ve never updated the door knobs. Said goodbye to those shag floors and painted the paneled ceilings. Yes, ceilings! But we’ll save that for another discussion. Still, we overlooked the things we touch every day.

As I walked the long hall to the bedroom the other day while making plans to re-stain the old doors and bring some richness back to the dry wood, I noted that NOT ONE door knob was the same. Between the bedrooms, bathrooms, hall closet, and basement stairway, there are seven different door knobs. Most of them are just plain hideous. Are our hands made of steel wool? How are they so scuffed?

Gold, brass, bronze, and pewter. We have them all. Or is it nickel?

I guess that over the last seventy years, the knobs broke one by one and got replaced. Several of the doors are replacements we picked up from a restoration place that reclaims building materials. We just kept the hardware on those. Why bother to change them when nothing matched anyway?

And so, for the first time in nearly two decades, we’re going to have matching door levers. On ALL the doors. Why am I giddy about this? Ones with elegant curved handles that can be opened with your elbow on days when the arthritis in your wrists is just too much. The last thing you need is a wrestling match just to leave the bathroom if you’ve already accomplished a full-body workout while putting on compression socks.

Forget the little knobby things you have to twist either. I got levers with punch buttons that pop out when you turn the handle. Again, arthritis. One motion.

At this stage of life, I’ve officially shifted my focus from fleeting indulgences to practical rewards. Gone are the days when a fancy coffee with whipped cream was the pinnacle of self-care. Instead, I’ve come to appreciate the satisfaction of long-lasting and perfectly matched door knobs.

This shift feels like a rite of passage into peak adulthood (because isn’t that what midlife is?), where the simple pleasures of aesthetics are not feng shui but functional. At this point in life, I'm just trying to keep things from falling apart—myself included.

Oh, and on the way home, I did pick up an iced mocha, no whip. At this age, self-care can be all the things.