My Own Repair Shop Moment

For the past months, we have found so much joy in a TV show on the BBC called The Repair Shop. The basic premise is a group of insanely-talented craftsmen and women take on the repairs and/or restoration of items that people bring into them. In short, the transformations are amazing, but the best part of each episode, to me, is the stories they tell about their items. The history, the memories, the emotion that is tied to each item is so incredibly heart-warming. People hang onto items, no matter how broken, because of the memories attached to a moment in time when the item worked, when it was brand new, or how it was used by someone they loved. And they bring the item in because they so long to rekindle those feelings, those emotions that are fused to the items that they have held onto for years, even decades.

I have often wondered how they feel when the repaired item comes home with them. Without question, they are thrilled with their treasure when they pick it up; there is laughter, smiles and, frequently, tears of joy. But when you have lived with a “broken” item for so long, is it different when that brokenness is gone? And how? I recently experienced my own Repair Shop moment, so I have a little more insight into this.

Soon after my grandmother died, just before my sixteenth birthday, my grandfather gave me an antique mantel clock that I had seen and admired in their basement. He was going to just throw it away until I spoke up, telling my mom that grandma had said I could have it someday. My grandfather consented and I claimed my treasure.

I believe the clock, an Ansonia porcelain mantel clock circa 1885, belonged to my great-grandmother, Margaret, who lived with them for a time. I never knew her, but my mother often compared me to Margaret, so I have long felt a connection to her. To most people, the clock was hideous – gaudy and flowery and very typically Victorian. But to me, who my sister once described as “an old lady in a kid’s body,” it was fantastic! And for more than 40 years I have held onto that clock and loved it. But I had never heard it working. Not even so much as one little tick. I didn’t even know if it could work because I didn’t have a key for it. But a couple of years ago, I decided I had to try. And, so, I brought it to a brilliant little clock repair shop and hoped for the best.

Now, the thing with people who can fix these types of clocks is that they are extremely rare, which also means they are extremely busy. It was a very long wait, but last week he called me and said it was ready. Two days ago, I drove to his shop to pick it up and, for the first time ever, in more than the entire 40+ years of my ownership of the clock, I heard it ticking. I was mesmerized by it. He spent the next 15-20 minutes telling me all about my clock: what was broken, why it didn’t work, what he had to do to fix it, how to wind it and how often, how to adjust the speed if it is running too fast or too slow, how to care for it, etc. I had to force myself to focus on what he was saying because all I could hear was the ticking of my clock, and all I could think about was what it would sound like when it struck the hour! Finally, he said, “Do you want to hear it strike?”

“Oh, yes!”

He moved the hands to the top of the hour, I heard the mechanism draw back, and then five very clear, glorious chimes. I must have been grinning like the cheshire cat. It was the most beautiful sound – one that I had waited to hear for my entire life.

He carefully removed the pendulum and showed me how to put it back when I got home. Then he carefully packed it up for me and I headed home with my beloved clock. On the drive, I became aware that I had only ever known the clock as something broken. I now had the responsibility of loving and caring for it as a working clock, something useful. I think people can be like that, too. When someone we have come to love in their brokenness chooses to “repair” themselves either in losing weight, changing their lifestyle, giving up an addiction, getting therapy to heal from past traumas, or find faith to heal their soul, we then have the responsibility and joy of getting to know and love them in their repaired condition. It's not always easy to do, and sometimes we feel unable to do it at all, but if we can see the heart of them, broken or repaired, we can still love them, maybe even love them more.

I’ve often heard that a ticking clock that chimes, particularly a mantel clock, is like the heartbeat of a home. Listening to the soft tick-tock of my great-grandmother’s clock, and the hourly chimes, I now know that to be true. And I can not only hear the heart of my treasure, it has become the heartbeat of my home.