Outlet Mouse Says Hello and Goodbye

As I was cleaning behind the fridge Sunday morning, I noticed something I hadn't ever seen before. It was a little mouse sticking its head out of the electrical outlet. At first I thought "how cute" and wondered if he was still alive. That's when several lessons came back hard and were re-learned through an instant of pain. It would be nice if I could say that a lesson learned is never forgotten, but as I get older and the memory capacity of my biological memory chip becomes rusty, the realization that learning is not what is happening - it is re-learning.

Re-learning is a skill that is not taught. It demonstrates the onset of senility that crowns decades of self-inflicted abuse that rarely gives up any grace. In my case, it at least left me no stress, and thousands of pages of notes, mostly searchable. Has anyone found a system that captures failure any better? Probably, but it's not teachable. You have to do more than see someone provide the solution - you have to recognize it too. To remember hard lessons many do some strange things. Sometimes it's as simple as posting post its. Sometimes it's a color scheme that works. Sometimes it's a scar to remind you that you have lived. We can only pray that it's never a lost limb. I've seen people use all the systems - self developed or accidentally owned. Some are attractive ideas, many are a bad fit, and the rest are just ugly, at least to me.

I shared this story with a friend today, and as I modified it slightly to mention the hot is on the right when it comes to electricity, unlike plumbing, he mentioned that the new electrical code is to install the outlets upside down so the ground is on the top and the hot is on the left. My first thought was that I had seen the upside down configuration a few times and thought it was just a rookie electrician making it up as she was going along, but that could be wrong. I really don't know, and quite frankly, I'm not curious enough to invest the 5 minutes to find out. Let's just say that maybe the upside down outlet somehow made its way into my subconscious, and I didn't "forget" the hot is on the right, but I expected it to be on the left. I admit that's far fetched.

In some nutshell somewhere, re-learning seems to be an exercise in tenacity. The push to remember what you forgot can be futile, so I just let it happen. I don't force the issue. It's a less painful take-it-as-it-comes and mellow-your-response-to-new-things approach. Based on the shock I got, I can tell you the second part of that approach missed the less-painful mark. Ouch!

Let's talk about learning things for the first time. This is completely different than re-learning. Everything is new, and it can be taught. You can get certified. Ask me about my stub-your-toe certification sometime. I can tell you from experience that the certification is useless, and I can't tell you how many times I've re-learned that particular lesson. When it comes right down to it, I think learning is overwatered. The best way to learn is the hard way. That leads to much less re-learning, although you have to make a hefty up-front payment in pain in most cases.

The first time I learned about the 120 volts being painful, but not deadly turned out to be a practical joke played on me. I had picked up a new doorbell and a so-called friend was helping me hook it up. He was an electrician and wired it up with a custom plug in chord he made for the wall outlet, and when I pressed the doorbell, I experienced for the first time in my life that 120 volts of electricity running up my arm. After the laughter was over, I read the directions and connected the DC adapter that was conveniently hidden under the couch cushions. There was actually a bonus lesson learned that day - don't keep friends that play practical jokes.

That bonus lesson really stuck with me. I became weary of people that played practical jokes. It became a steadfast boundary with me, and I have since become an expert at identifying people with this trait and avoiding them. There are a few lessons I have learned and never re-learned, and that lesson is one of just a few.

The mouse thing was new. I had spent decades working out how to keep mice out of the house including working with feral cats and non-venomous snakes to make life near my home safe for them and not annoying to me. You have to feed the cats when it gets really cold out, and I let some brush build up each summer to keep them safe from owls, hawks and falcons. Snakes can take care of themselves, but I leave a rock pile near by so they have a place to sleep in the winter. Note that this was the first mouse I had seen in many many years. I had a renter in, and she keep stuff in cardboard boxes, so I'm sure the mouse came from one of the boxes. Keeping your stuff in plastic boxes with a top is how you keep mice from moving with you when you move. That was one of those lessons that took me decades to learn, and it's one of the rare lessons I never had to re-learn.

Learning and re-learning is my life and always has been, and I'm grateful when I can find some humor in each lesson.