Week 6: Water Closet and Exterior Plans

I’ve been thinking about learned helplessness vs. self-efficacy. It’s been very easy, especially lately, to feel like the world in general has spun completely out of my control. Protesters are getting scooped up by unmarked vans in downtown Portland. There’s everything short of open armed conflict going on not twenty minutes from where I live.

US case count is skyrocketing; there’s a long list of countries US citizens aren’t permitted. US politicization of mask wearing endangers thousands of lives. Incompetent handling of a public health crisis means that, as a country, we’re going to have a double punch here, the worst of both worlds: Unnecessary deaths and long-term health complications for people with severe responses to the virus, and an economic crash that’s going to cause many, many people who were living on the edge to fall off completely. The scale of the human tragedy, both in the US and elsewhere, will be enormous, and we haven’t even begun to feel it yet (unless you work in a medical profession or have a personal connection with someone who has been very sick or who has died).

It would be remarkably easy to let the weight of all of that sink in, and sink into my bed. And not get up again. To binge watch Netflix, eat too much sugar, and brood. I did some of that, back in March, and am determined not to go there again (well, frankly, I’m still eating a lot of sugar). This house project has helped me stay away from that place, thanks in no small part to the sense of efficacy that grows when I learn a new skill, practice it several dozen times, and come out the other side much better able to repeat it in the future in different contexts.

The house isn’t the cure to all my woes — building it doesn’t actually make things better in the broader world, though it’s difficult to know what to do there and I feel as though I’ve used my resources to make an impact as much as I’m able to at this time, both in my personal and professional capacities as a staff member at a non-profit. But it gives me something I can get better at, and link efforts to results in a very concrete way. I’m glad to have embarked on this project, even as the broader challenges have made the build much more difficult and slower than it would have been otherwise.