💬 I threw out the broken umbrella that had been behind my door since June

It was a black umbrella with 2 bent ribs and a handle that came off if you pulled hard. I bought it in June last year for 250 rupees from the shop outside Nampally station. It broke in the first monsoon. A gust at Koti turned it inside out. I walked home holding it like a dead bird. And then I put it behind my bedroom door. Where it stayed for about 8 months. I don't know why I kept it. I told myself I'd get it repaired. I never took it to anyone. Every morning I walked past it. Every evening I walked past it again. It started to feel like a small guilt. Like a pending phone call, or a message I hadn't replied to. Except it was an umbrella. My mother saw it once and asked why I'd kept it. I said I'd fix it. She said, fix it with what? Last Sunday I was cleaning and I just picked it up. Walked to the bin and dropped it in. It took 3 seconds. I stood there for a moment, a bit stunned at how easy it was. Then I went back inside and noticed that the corner behind my door was empty, and bright. I don't think I'd looked at that corner for months. It had a bit of floor in it. I bought a new umbrella the next day. Blue, 300 rupees, and it opens on the first try. It rained that evening. It held up. I walked home feeling quite smug about it. Does anyone else keep broken things for far too long? Chargers, chairs, an old fan? I've got a table lamp in the other room that hasn't worked since 2022. I'm thinking about it now.

Walking past a broken umbrella every morning for 8 months, that is a commitment. I kept a leaking steel flask on my kitchen shelf for a whole year and moved it from side to side whenever I cleaned. Throwing it out felt like a small win. Did you buy a new umbrella the same day, or wait for the next rain?

Same feeling as finally deleting an app you haven't opened in a year. Small cleanup, weirdly good. Last week I deleted 34 apps. 3 food delivery apps, 2 I'd never heard of, and a torch app from 2018. Phone got faster. Storage went from red to green. I felt like a new man for about an hour. Then I downloaded 1 of the food apps back that evening.