Last week a young woman came to live with us. Her first
evening we gave her a heater since our basement guest room was quite cold.
Later we also gave her a hair dryer.
A few mornings later she walked up stairs
and hesitantly said, “There’s a problem”...the lights had blown
out when she tried to run both the heater and hair dryer in her room at
the same time. She thought some permanent damage had happened.
“No worries”, I said.
We walked down to the furnace room, and I introduced her to
the fuse box:
Wonderful thing, a fuse box. Instead of a big, expensive, difficult-to-repair problem involving replacing wiring or putting out fires, it was a simple fix; I simply switched the circuit breaker back on and showed her how she could fix it herself next time. Her response? “Thanks. I guess I know I can’t run both at the same time now”.
Wonderful thing, a fuse box. Instead of a big, expensive, difficult-to-repair problem involving replacing wiring or putting out fires, it was a simple fix; I simply switched the circuit breaker back on and showed her how she could fix it herself next time. Her response? “Thanks. I guess I know I can’t run both at the same time now”.
In that moment she learned a lesson; and while she
experienced some inconvenience, no damage was done.
Now, as I think about it, I hope and pray that we can be her
fuse box for many situations over the next months…financial, education, job,
health, etc...
…where she can try things out, and if she fails,
instead of being a major event, we can just show her what happened, help her
embed what she learned and not suffer any real long-term damage.
I guess that’s what I hope I’m doing for my kids, too.
Providing an environment where they can fail fast, fail safe, and while there
may be some pain, some recovery involved on their part, it won’t be
anything serious.
~~~~~~
I later went to go look at other heaters, and found
that some heaters have their own fuse box built into the power cord. This
way the heater will trigger it’s own fuse, and it can control its own safety
and not be dependent on someone else's fuse box.
That’s what I really hope we build into both this young
woman and my kids. I want to help them build their own fuse
box so that when they go out on their own, they are equipped to handle
what comes, prepared with fuses with certain limits so that they don’t get damaged
when something unexpected comes their way.
Each of their fuse boxes will be different…since some can
handle more stress than others…some can handle more social difficulties than
others…and some can handle more financial risk than others. But by helping each
young person build their own fuse box, they will have custom limits based on
how they are wired.
…how they are wired...
Each one is wired uniquely. Maybe it’s my mission to help
them figure out what gauge wiring they have so that their fuse box is
built for THEM…what they can handle, not based on my expectations of what I
WISH they could handle.
Fuse boxes are also equipped with a ground wire…so that if a
traumatic event happens, the excessive load can be taken on by a greater
power…like how a ground wire transfers damaging energy from a lightning
strike through the wire into the Earth. Maybe a really great fuse box for this
young woman’s life and our kids lives is to never forget the ground wire…never
forget to depend on something...someone...greater than them. That their faith
can bring them through times that would have completely blown out their fuse
box, and while they may have pain, while they may need to recover, they would
have a foundation to re-build on that will never abandon them.
In the end, I want them to thrive on their own…live life to
the fullest, and not worry. Having their own fuse box (with ground
wire) in their inner furnace room may help them do just that.
