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I’m Shocked

1935

What makes little kids stick things into electrical outlets? Curiosity? Stupidity?

I can remember sparks of electricity sputtering from the outlet like an Independence Day sparkler, when I shoved a bobby-pin into it, and the electrical surge that caused me to back off permanently from anything that looked suspiciously electrical, cords, plugs, sockets ... it didn’t matter. The expression used in those days was ‘Once burned, twice shy’.

When I was growing up, there were no three-prong outlets (with a ground), so the chance of getting shocked was much greater than it is now. Then, there were two wires, one black and one white, one was taken to ‘ground’ where they drove a stake into the earth, and later on hooked them up to a water pipe. Now there is a ‘ground’ wire which is green or bare copper, and 2 wires go to ‘ground’.

If a lamp, say, had ‘short’ in it, it would send out a shock of electricity when the cord connected to the outlet. We now have circuit breaker boxes in the house. However, my dad would go to the fuse box and stick a penny in it when a fuse would blow. The penny shorts around where the fuse was when it was ‘short-circuited’. The penny allows electricity to continue to heat and similar to the ‘fusion’ an arc-welder does of metal to metal, the penny continues the electrical process.

Why my father thought my experience was funny could only be caused by his upbringing. His mother died when he was very young, and he was pretty much raised by his three sisters, Ollie, Mollie and Hattie. He probably got attention by acting out and teasing them and this carried over into his parenting.

He found out, after my initial response to ‘the plug’ that I would scream and run at the sight of anything electrical. He could chase me with a plug that was not attached to a cord, and make the buzzing sound of an electrical short and I was off and running to hide behind my mother’s apron.

"Poppy, stop that teasing!" mother would say. Of course she never had a clue that my reactions would be life long.

I watched him repair frayed electrical cords out in his shop, but I always kept my distance, because I never knew when one would jump out at me to cause fright and flight. Sure enough, sometime during the process, he would turn quickly, stick the pronged plug toward my arm or leg, and I was off…screaming to high heaven for help!

Related to electricity, I also have another really odd characteristic. I can rub my knuckle up against any electrical appliance, like a coffee pot, or a toaster, and I can ‘feel’ the charge of electricity in it. I can tell whether it is plugged into the outlet or not.

The first time Richie saw me doing this he was curious.

"Why did you rub the coffee pot?"

"To see if it’s plugged in, silly!" I said.

"Come again?" he said.

"If I rub my knuckle on it I can tell if it’s plugged in at the wall outlet."

"You’re kidding,"

"No, can’t everybody?" I asked.

"Well, no!"

Then he went into a long series of tests on me, like I was from another planet. He would plug in the coffee pot, and have me rub it…then unplug the pot ... and I’d rub it and say ‘No’.

He did tests with me blind folded. I could do it with lamps, radios, televisions and with my electric blanket. I could also rub his arm in bed at night and know if his electric blanket was turned on.

I assumed with his electrical engineering background that he would have all the answers. Instead, he’s practically worn out switches and plugs before their time, just testing me to see if I still have this strange talent.

"Do you think I have more or less electricity in my body?"

"I don’t know,"

"Do you think I don’t have a ground?"

"I don’t know,"

"Would this be why I’m so jumpy?" I know I am terribly skittish, but it’s not something I do on purpose.

"I don’t know ... you’re a curiosity to me, I’ve never heard of anyone being able to do this."

I’ve always said that I will probably die of fright.

Just someone walking up behind me and laying a hand on my shoulder can make me jump out of my skin. Blame it on my dad, he pre-programmed me to be jumpy by chasing me around the house with extension cords that weren’t in use!

I am still this way.

I say, I’m just easily shocked!

POST SCRIPT: My extra-sensory power to respond to electricity is still a fact of life. Just another one of those things about me that is unexplainable but predictable. It’s easy to see that I was programmed for the jumpiness, but this other part of the phenomenon just gets curiouser and curiouser!

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