This morning as I was getting Kaia ready for school, I reached into the fridge to grab her some milk when I realized that it felt weirdly warm. The top shelf of the fridge was hot. The temperature reading on the fridge said it was 53 F. WHAT?

We called the handyman to come see what was wrong and ended up having to completely empty out the fridge and the freezer. They had to be completely replaced, so they gave us a spare fridge sitting in the basement of the building. Some collateral damage happened along the way, too: the handyman and porter lost grip of the (extremely heavy) fridge facade glass door, and the corner of the door fell onto the bamboo floor boards. This resulted in a huge hole in the middle of our kitchen floor, which they said they’d replace and fix tomorrow.

So I ended up having to spend time cleaning all the bottoms of jars and containers in the fridge and then spraying and wiping down the new parts of the replacement fridge we were given. It was annoying, but luckily, all our perishable goods still have a place to go into and won’t go bad.

It’s in these moments when I realize that the premium we pay to live in our building actually does have a lot of value to us. In these times, we immediately get help and replacements, and it’s just included in the high rent we pay. And that’s a pretty darn good thing to have.