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Topic: Power (05/10/04)
TITLE: A Little Light on the Subject of Power By Melanie Kerr 05/10/04 |
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As usual, when things get broken, they stay broken for a while. Who looks at lamp shades anyway? Most of the other lampshades in the house have elaborate spiders webs adding a little individual creativity to the scene.
It was the beginning of the summer holiday and I decided to tackle the broken lampshade. How difficult could it be? It was probably not difficult at all under normal circumstances. It is not normal circumstances when the whole light fitting disintegrates into tiny fragments in your hand. Please don’t say I should have got my husband to do it. He and electricity have a “shocking” relationship.
DIY shops sell everything you need and also print lots of little leaflets about how to do most things and changing a light fitting was there in black and white print.
I honestly thought I had switched off the electricity before I started playing around with the screwdriver. You could have given me a polygraph at that point and it would have backed up my story.
There was a small but definite explosion just above my head. There was a flash of light and a puff of smoke. You will be glad to know I didn’t singe anything significant.
I descended the ladder faster than any angel in Jacob’s dream. I looked suspiciously at the remains of the old light fitting. Then I switched off the electricity.
Taking the old fitting down and replacing it with the new one was a stroll in the park. I followed the instructions carefully. I made sure that the wires were going where they should have gone according to the diagram. I screwed in the light bulb, came down the ladder and turned on the light switch.
Get ready to take a bow, audience get ready for tumultuous applause, pens at the ready for autographs. However, the light switch being on had no effect on the bulb. It remained off.
Wait a minute though! Did I not forget to switch on the electricity at the mains? Hold the applause. I ran through to the back porch and slammed down the big switch in the meter cupboard.
“Let there be light!” Please? The light didn’t come on.
For the next half hour or so, like some manic game show contestant trying to hit the right button and light up the winners prize, I ran between the meter cupboard and the ladder, wiring and rewiring, screwing and unscrewing the light bulb to no avail. I even tried every light bulb in the box, just in case. The light remained stubbornly off. The instructionson the leaflet shed no light on what to do next. I was in the dark literally and metaphorically.
This was one failure that I had no intention of confessing to my husband. I phoned a handy man. He was very handy. I explained what I had attempted to do. He looked over my handy work and complemented me on my nice tight screws.
Then I told him about the explosion, the flash of light and the puff of smoke. What I would never have come up with in a million years, he diagnosed in seconds. I had blown a fuse. No amount of wiring and rewiring was going to make any difference. A small six inch strip of fuse wire was what I needed.
Without being condescending or mocking my efforts, he explained a little about electrical wiring. If tiny little bits of an electrical circuits are missing, like for example the fuse wire, there is no power.
God had got power that he just wants to pour into our lives. Some of us have nice lampshades. Some of us have the whole Christian thing wired up correctly. We have even bought new bulbs. We switch on expecting to live powerful lives before people around us. Nothing happens because of a missing piece of spiritual fuse wire. Sometimes we look at the big things, the obvious things, the visible things but neglect to think about the very small things, the seemingly insignificant things or the hidden things.
I am no expert on these things, but it’s quite possible that you have blown a fuse.