Author -

Blinking Lights

 
This is a trouble call that an older lead lineman told us the other day.
I thought you might get a kick out of it.

This is a local town district with only two lineman and four utility men covering six towns and lots of miles of transmission and distribution lines through piney  woods and swamp land.

Many times the lineman have to cover trouble calls for the
utility men to get their DOT time cleared. On this particular case, one of the lineman had to go to a blinking lights call in the town that he grew up in. He knew the older lady that made the call. She had taught school in that town and had taught Ben a few times while he was a boy.  he attended the same church as Ben and taught his Sunday school class.

Ben is now a crusty old lead-lineman himself with many hours of line
maintenance and construction under his well weathered belt. He arrived a
the call and was promptly asked inside were a cup of coffee and a slice
of homemade pie was waiting for him. He took off his scuffed up hard
hat and wiped his knarled climbing boots as best he could before he
entered the little woman's house.

It was an old frame house and its boards creaked under Bens feet as she
walked him to the kitchen and made him sit for the coffee and pie. He hadn't been called Benjamin for quite a while so he listened to her problem as he sipped the coffee and nibbled uncomfortably at the pie. It seemed that every time she walked down her hallway, the light in the middle of it flickered, and it caused her great distress whenever she had to use the bathroom at night.

Ben excused himself from the kitchen and she followed intently as he flicked on the hall light and proceeded down the hall. Sure enough with every| step he took the single bulb in the light fixture, flickered. Ben
passed under it a time or two and assured himself of what the cause of
the problem was. When he passed under it the next time, he stopped long enough to reach up and tighten the loose bulb. He made a few test
passes to make sure he had found the trouble, as did the old school
teacher.

She was quite satisfied with his work and even drug him down
or a thankful peck on his raspy cheek. He plunked his hard hat down
as he left and clomped off of her porch as she waived good-bye.
Another trouble call complete and another satisfied customer