The Message, Volume 44, Number 3, September 2009 Page: 2 of 14
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With Rabbi Rosen
Deferred Maintenance
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steps backward.
Take a moment to watch the shades of sky. Take a
moment to enjoy a stranger’s passing smile. Take a moment
to cool down when things heat up. Take a moment to hold
on and take a moment to let go. Take a moment to make
something that doesn’t matter, matter more. Take a moment
to listen when someone tells you that you matter. Don’t
defer living and loving. Life is over in a moment and every
moment needs maintenance.
K
m
TT’m a big fan of Noah ben Shea, author of 18 wonderful
I books and a weekly email on life called “Noahs Window. ”
Several years ago, he wrote a thoughtful column entitled
“Deferred Maintenance, ” which I’d like to share with you
this month. When I read it, I thought
it would be a wonderful way to begin
preparing ourselves for the High
Holidays. I’m happy to reprint it here
with Noah ben Shea s permission.
1' ■ |r
surprised to wake up bald. A great deal that surprises us is
no surprise. Defer what you need to deal with emotionally,
intellectually, physically, financially or spiritually and
eventually you don’t have maintenance, you have a mess.
There are some things in life that finally getting around to on
a Sunday afternoon can’t fix. Some stuff broken for too long
is going to stay broke.
Maintenance is just that. Maintenance is different from
a make over. Maintenance is not about transforming yourself
but dealing with the day to day which is already transforming.
Because we decide to defer dealing with things doesn’t mean
things are going to be patient with us. Life stuff doesn’t
stand still. It runs away from us, toward us, or over us. Life
is dynamic, and change is the only constant. Defer the lube
job on your Chevy, your fears, your plans, your heart, or your
hopes for too long and it’s too bad, too late.
Defer dealing with love, lovers, and how you love and the
question isn’t what you will learn but how much it will hurt
when you do. If we defer maintenance in our relationships,
whether it’s parenting or passion, what we don’t do has
already done something. People fall in love every day and
. fall out of love day after day.
We’re all ready to buy into
love but less of us are ready
to give it the day to day
maintenance love requires.
If we’re smart we’ll work at
love. Love isn’t only about
intentions but attention.
Promises we break
can break our spirit.
Maintenance deferred can
be a source of depression.
Where we want to go and
don’t, what we know we
need to do, promise we will
do and don’t can be two
'A ’
Whether we’re young, or old,
or getting older we’ve all got to deal
with deferred maintenance. We’ve all
got stuff we need to do and haven’t
done. We’ve all got stuff we said
we would do, crossed our hearts,
promised under a summer moon, and still have not done, and
summer turns to fall. Promises deferred promise to haunt us
in any season of our lives.
Deferred maintenance for some is mowing the lawn,
and for some it is cutting out cigarettes. For some it is
washing the car, and for
some it is scrubbing away
an old attitude. For some
it is finding something that
has been lost, and for some
it is losing an old grudge.
For some it is dealing with a
stack of bills, and for all of us
it’s about time we dealt with
ourselves. We can blame
circumstances and others /
for what we haven’t done / .
but most of us eventually '
have to look at why we did
what we haven’t done.
To maintain takes day
to day maintenance. Day
in and day out. We may have the best of intentions about
deferred maintenance, but events, ranging from the best to
the worst in life, are seldom deferred by our intentions. What
we put off is sometimes put right on top of us. What we
ignore doesn’t necessarily ignore us.
Crisis crosses all of our paths. Sometimes we get no
warning. Sometimes we ignore all the warnings. Aman wakes
up for years with hair on his pillow and then one morning is
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Congregation Beth Yeshurun (Houston, Tex.). The Message, Volume 44, Number 3, September 2009, periodical, September 21, 2008; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1318680/m1/2/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.