I was standing in our dining room with one of my older daughters. We were having a conversation when we heard a loud noise. The door of our china cabinet, inches away from our elbows, flew open. A cascade of china fell to the floor at our feet.

While we were standing very close to it, neither of us had been touching the cabinet. My having seen what happened with my own eyes took away the anxiety I usually experience when I find something broken. I knew no one was at fault, so I was able to skip the Who Is To Blame step of dealing with brokenness.

If I hadn’t been in the room the moment the accident happened, I would have spent serious bandwidth trying to figure out how an accident like that could have happened without human interaction. Yet it clearly had.

Out on our front porch, AKA the holding area, was a Depression-era dining room buffet my parents had passed on to us this fall. As they prepare to downsize to a smaller house, I inherited this beautiful piece of furniture which was given to my paternal grandmother for her services as a home care nurse.

The place our china cabinet occupied was the only spot in our house where the buffet would fit and be safe from the bumping and thumping kids, but I liked the china cabinet and wasn’t ready to part with it when the buffet arrived at our door. The thought of getting rid of it made me feel sad.The china cabinet had glass doors for displaying pretty dishes, and metal bars across the glass which were perfect for the kids’ artwork or cards from friends. I had painted the inside of it to make it brighter, and replaced the knobs with fancy ones from Anthropologie, one of my favorite mini-splurge furniture upgrades.

The china cabinet has been in our lives for many years – my big kids were babies and toddlers when we got it. A man had been cleaning out his parents’ house after they passed and my dad, knowing I love old furniture, had taken a few pieces the man was getting rid of and brought them up my way, including the china cabinet.As we stood amidst the piles of broken ceramic bowls and glass shards, a quick assessment showed that miraculously, none of my maternal grandmother’s china, which was stored inside, had been chipped or broken, despite the fact that one glass shelf had completely snapped and crashed down on another, which had collapsed.

I had lost my trust. Knowing another shelf could collapse at any time (and if I hadn’t been in the room, I would never have believed it was a random occurrence), the cabinet had to go. Plus, it was garbage night, which made the switch a no-brainer.We cleaned up the broken pottery, saving the pieces to be repaired, and threw away the tiny bits of glass and pottery that remained. Then, the cabinet went straight to the curb.

Usually in our neighborhood, anything of value left on the curb disappears quickly, giving me the sense that it has gone to a better home. I stayed away from the front of the house so if it was left behind to be picked up by the garbage men, I wouldn’t have to know.

With the china cabinet out to pasture, we brought the buffet into its new home.

I have had a big beautiful mirror hanging out under my bed for a few years now – When I bought it, it was on sale, and I “needed” a large round mirror with a chunky frame. I thought I had a spot for it.

When it arrived, it was too fantastic for the spot I had planned, and honestly, hanging a heavy mirror in a way that wouldn’t involve a terrible accident seemed above my pay grade. I wrapped it in blankets and put it under my bed until I could decide what to do. Every time I saw it sitting under there, I felt a little guilty.With the lower profile of the buffet, the empty wall space above it was the perfect (and relatively safe) place for the mirror, and even better, a mirror would reflect the light from the windows on the opposite side of the room.

I’d gone from complete resistance to change to being not just resigned, but relieved.

There are things to get used to about the buffet. We have to re-learn how to find stuff. The metal rings which open the drawers rattle whenever the room shakes, and our rooms shake a lot – so I installed sticky putty silencers under each ring. I waxed squeaky drawers and rearranged table linens and dishes until things felt right.

This morning, I hung the heavy mirror using the hardware that came with it and amazingly hadn’t gotten lost while it lived under my bed.The moment right after the cascade of broken things was such a surprise. But I didn’t feel upset. My daughter looked at me. “You know,” she said, “there’s a way to repair pottery using gold.”

“Kintsugi?” I said. “I guess it’s time to learn.”

As a philosophy, [kintsugi] treats breakage and repair as part of the history of an object, rather than something to disguise.” (Wikipedia’s kintsugi entry)

I’ve known about kintsugi for a long time. Whenever I looked at the kits online, the cost, or the practicality (can you put the repaired dishes in the dishwasher? Safely eat from them?) stopped me.

I’ve tried to repair dishes before, but with the heavy use dishes at our house get, the dishes frequently break along the original cracks not long after they’ve been repaired, regardless of what type of glue I use.

Last night, I ordered a kintsugi kit from a Dutch company  I’d hoped to visit in person while I was in Amsterdam, but had run out of time. It felt like a full circle move straight from the the Universe. I made a change that needed to be made, and now I’ll finally be learning a skill I’ve been meaning to learn.

I’ve always been a bit troubled by my relationship with things. I know rust and moths destroy and thieves steal (Matt. 6:19), but I want my home to be a beautiful place with beautiful things. And I have seven kids who remind me daily Why We Can’t Have Nice Things.

Now I have a large serving bowl full of spare ceramic parts that may someday be beautiful, mended works of art. I have a spot in my home that looks brand new without my having spent any money (recently, at least). I have a new curiosity about why I need someone to blame when something breaks or disappears, an idea I’ve been examining for a while now.

Do you need to know Who Did It to move on when something is lost or broken? Are you OK with your relationship to your stuff? Do you find yourself using words like “guilt” about inanimate objects?

What prompts you to make changes in your life? Do you just wake up one morning and do it, or does something out of your control tend to force you to try a new path?