July 5, 1990

Wednesday's paper carried the story of a Louisiana man who was apparently electrocuted when his sweat dripped into the electric drill he was using to build a swing set in his back yard. In the oppressive summer heat, his attempt at constructive activity met with a tragic consequence.
Imagine that; life shocked away while engaged in the noblest of pursuits-creating a plaything for a grandchild.
Now, the man could be immortalized as the patron saint of playground equipment, or he could be used by the makers of power tools as an example of what happens when you don’t read the instruction manual. He may become an icon used by couch potatoes across the land to justify their vegetative existence, or he may become known to history (after his fifteen minutes of breakfast table fame have elapsed) as just another unfortunate soul with overactive sweat glands.
We read the article with interest because we were preparing to defy the heat and slap some paint on the house. We took particular note of the article because the portion of the house to be painted includes the electricity meter and the shiny metal power line.
Electricity to us, two centuries after Franklin and a century after Edison, remains a mysterious phenomenon, something not understandable-somewhat like rap music. We flip on the television and see the image, we turn on the radio and hear the sound, we press the button on the microwave and get hot pizza, but don’t ask us how. We know not to dry our hair while still in the bathtub. We know not to unclog the toaster with a fork, and we know cats should not be encouraged to lick electricity outlets. But we don’t know why something so kind and beneficial (we quickly go crazy during power outages) could be malevolent to the point of killing a perspiring man building a swing set in his back yard.
Our first awareness of electricity’s split personality came on a tranquil summer day during our tranquil childhood. Bill Serkland, the kid down the street who knew everything because he had an older brother, was tossing a ball around in the yard. By accident or design, the ball landed on the roof and we were forced to pile a chair atop the picnic table and climb to the roof to retrieve it.
Because the roof was a place to which we seldom ventured, we made the most of our visit, checking out the shuffle board equipment stored under the eaves, looking down into the neighbors’ yard from our hilltop vantage point, waving with dominion at the kids far below playing in the sprinkler. And then we approached the power wires and telephone line which served as an umbilical cord, connecting our house to the electric mother power poles which loomed in the alley. Three black-wrapped power lines swept down from the pole, and one thin telephone line.
“You can touch one of these power lines at a time,” Bill Serkland said. “But you touch two at a time, you’re dead.”
Parental warning had long since made us wary of the wires, and so when we saw Bill stroll nonchalantly over and grab a wire we half-expected to see him snapped rigid, then fried to a crisp black by the surge of electricity. But he held the line like it was a long piece of licorice, grinning a wise grin.
Then he eased over to the telephone line. “You can grab this one, too. But just make sure nobody calls while you’ve got a hold of it. A call comes over the line when you’re touching it, you’re dead.”
He hesitated long enough to draw in a deep breath, then grabbed the line tightly for a bold moment before, alive and triumphant, letting loose.
“Go ahead,” he said. “Grab ahold. Your mom’s probably not expecting any calls.”
There we were, atop the house on what had been a tranquil day, having our courage questioned. “My sister gets a lot of calls during the day.” A feeble offering. The corner of Bill Serkland’s mouth went up as the corner of his skeptical eye came down. Our bluff had been called.
And so, thinking that life had been sweet, and hoping that fate would still the dialing finger of any would-be caller, we sidled over to the telephone line and reached out and touched it. No call, no power surge, no death.
As we jumped down from the roof, having tempted fate, having looked death in the eye and barely blinked, we realized just how sweet life was, how exhilarating, how thrilling.
We hope the Louisiana man came to that same realization before his call came…. ~T.Stucky