Fixing more than appliances at the Toledo Repair Café
TOLEDO – It’s my favorite digital camera of all time, and Kodak stopped making it years ago. So, when my Kodak EasyShare stopped functioning properly I was desolate. Wonderful photographs and happy memories were created with that camera. An artist will tell you there’s nothing quite like their favorite paintbrush and when it’s broken or lost, things are never quite the same. That’s how I feel about my dark blue digital camera.
“Junk it!” was the most common advice I was given when looking for a way to fix my camera, but why should I throw it away? I didn’t want to give up on it when it seemed like a simple fix, but who fixes cameras in the Toledo area nowadays? Not many I discovered.
While searching for a new lightweight digital camera, I discovered they are complicated and costly. My simple-to-use, inexpensive digital camera has gone the way of the passenger pigeon. People tell me to use my cell phone camera for photography projects, but a phone is a phone in my opinion. I want a dedicated camera with a decent variable lens that takes a crisp picture and not just blurry selfies.
Imagine my surprise when I discovered a group who understood my plight and feelings in regards to my cherished camera, and they’re located right here in Toledo – and coming to a library branch near you.
The Toledo Repair Café meets in community rooms at various Toledo/Lucas County Public Library branches on the last Saturday of the month (barring holidays) from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. I attended their most recent event on Saturday at the Kent Branch at 3101 Collingwood Blvd.
Local fix-it experts (some young, some not so young) freely donate their time and talents to this co-ministry of Park United Church of Christ and the Baha’is of Sylvania. Their partnerships also include the Toledo/Lucas County Public Library, Northwest State Community College and the MultiFaith Council of NW Ohio.
Tim Casida, who works on computers and other related electronics, tried his best to repair my digital camera. A tiny plastic piece on the battery compartment door had snapped off, keeping the batteries from making consistent contact with the mechanism that turns the camera off and on. It’s the equivalent of a broken fingernail. Why should we fill our landfills with items that could be repaired, repurposed or reused?
Tim brought along a variety of old cameras to cannibalize parts from, but none quite fit. He thinks he might have an exact match lying somewhere in his attic, so he said to come back next time and see if it will work for my camera. In the meantime, Ol’ Blue is rubber-banded together and works well enough with a few glitches. But not everything can be saved—like the broken motor in our year-old UV fan—so it helps to maintain a realistic view.
The Toledo Repair Café is the brainchild of John Krochmalny and Gary Batts. According to Krochmalny, the repair café movement started in 2009 in Europe. There are now an estimated 3,191 repair cafés worldwide from the United States to the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, India and Japan.
The folks of the Toledo Repair Café do more than just fix cameras; they also repair lamps, fans, small appliances, bicycles, jewelry and clothing items. They help fix holes in our hearts, too. Krochmalny noted that our need for community and fellowship is sometimes lacking in this post-COVID world. The café is a place for folks to come together and enjoy a casual conversation over coffee and cookies while getting a prized possession fixed.
Krochmalny related a story from their first event that emphasizes their mission:
A woman came in with a very old piece of jewelry. It was broken and needed some links repaired so she could wear it again. She cried with joy as the repaired piece was handed back to her. She told us it had been given to her by her late husband who had passed away the week before. We mended more than just a piece of jewelry that day.
Yes, they did.
This is the angle I want to take with my column here at the Toledo Free Press. I’m calling my column Surviving and Thriving in Toledo. Each story will focus on a particular person or group/organization that is making a difference in how Toledo-area residents are surviving and thriving and helping their neighbors do the same.
Some topics I’d like to cover are food preservation and gathering tips, urban gardening, health care accessibility, housing, finding affordable clothing, self-help groups, and mutual aid groups. I’m open to hear about whatever you think would be of benefit to the community.
If you have an idea for a person or a group you think should be featured, please let me know. I’d love to share their story. Together we’ll create a record of the ingenuity and graciousness of Northwest Ohioans for future generations to learn from and possibly follow.
There’s no use in denying it—life isn’t easy nowadays. But if we come together and show each other hints and tips to get through these tough times, it will be worth it. Like the woman who thought her cherished piece of jewelry—and the precious memories surrounding it—were lost to her forever, we could find ourselves pleasantly surprised when a neighbor gives us a hand up and helps us along the road of life.
We can do more than survive, Toledo. We can thrive.
Click here to learn more about the movement and how you can even start your own repair café. You can also follow them on Facebook at Toledo Repair Café and online, where they have a calendar page with information on their upcoming fix-it events.
