The lightning storm took out more things than we realized at first.

Some lights stopped working. Outlets failed. The smart lights forgot how to be smart. Our workout system wouldn’t turn on. The refrigerator in the garage stopped keeping things as cold as it should.

Each day seemed to reveal one more casualty.

And the storm arrived during a season when things were already breaking. There had been a new hvac and car trouble and towing and repairs that didn’t quite seem to resolve the problem. There was a chipped tooth. There were phone calls and appointments and estimates and one more person I needed to follow up with.

But for some reason, it was the ice maker that distressed me the most.

I realize that sounds ridiculous.

We even own a countertop nugget ice machine, so we were not exactly facing life without ice. But I prefer the larger cubes from the freezer. They last longer in my cup. They come from my own filtered water in my own kitchen, which calms the part of me that thinks a little too much about germs.

I use that ice every day.

And it wasn’t just an ice maker inside an ordinary refrigerator. It was part of a built-in freezer, the kind that fits neatly into cabinetry and would be neither simple nor inexpensive to replace. Even investigating the problem felt like the beginning of another entire project.

Then my daughter said, “You know you can just make ice.”

Of course I knew that.

I already owned four ice trays from the Dollar Tree. I used them occasionally for specialty drinks—coffee cubes for iced coffee or freshly squeezed lemon and lime juice frozen to use later.

Still, it had somehow not occurred to me that I could use them simply to make ice.

So I pulled them from the cabinet, filled them with filtered water, and carefully carried them to the freezer.

A few hours later, I twisted the trays and emptied the cubes into the ice bin.

And as it turns out, I love that ice.

We all do.

The cubes are clear and clean-tasting. They’re larger than the ones the ice maker produced, and they last longer in a glass. Even the ritual has become strangely satisfying: filling each compartment, balancing the trays on the way to the freezer, waiting for the water to become solid, and twisting the plastic until the cubes crack loose and tumble into the bin.

Maybe it is the delayed gratification.

Or maybe it is simply the satisfaction of finishing something each day.

So much of life is open-ended.

Motherhood may be the clearest example of that. I do the laundry, but the laundry basket is never empty. I wash the dishes, but there are always more dishes. I make dinner, and an hour later someone is hungry again.

The work matters. It keeps the household moving and the people I love cared for. But there is rarely a moment when I can stand back, look at it, and say, “There. Finished.”

Making the ice feels different.

I fill the trays.

I put them in the freezer.

I wait.

Then I empty the cubes into the bin.

Done.

The next day, I do it again.

It is a small cycle, but it has a clear beginning and a clear end. I can complete the task, see the result, and mentally check it off. For once, the work stays finished for at least a little while.

So many things in life genuinely require an expert. Cars still need mechanics. Teeth still need dentists. Electrical systems need electricians, and built-in appliances eventually have to be repaired or replaced.

But not everything that stops working has to become an emergency.

Sometimes the modern convenience breaks, and underneath it is an older, simpler way that still works perfectly well.

Sometimes it even works better.

I would never have chosen to give up the automatic ice maker. I would have assumed making ice by hand was tedious and inconvenient, one more task added to a life that already contains plenty of them.

Instead, it has felt oddly refreshing, (pun intended). 

The repair company may eventually find the problem. The ice maker may begin humming again, producing cubes without any effort from me.

But now I’m not even sure I want it to.

I can imagine turning it off, pulling out my four Dollar Tree trays, and continuing to fill the bin with the ice we all agree is better.

Four plastic trays. Filtered water. A little patience.

As my daughter reminded me, I can always just make ice.