“Ouchie post!”

I can’t begin to tell you how many times that little voice popped up from the back seat of our car. But I knew what he meant. Our youngest had spied a new and unusual ouchie post and was wildly gesticulating, hoping I’d be just as excited to see it.

It was only recently, though, as we reminisced, that I learned more about the obsession.

Farmer Gary remembers that James wasn’t much more than a toddler at the time. Father and son were over at the farm and Gary pointed at a utility pole in the yard which connected the milk parlor with the electrical line that powered the farm house.

“See that, James? Don’t touch that. It’s an ouchie post.”

Well that’s all it took. From then on – for several years – James was on the lookout for ouchie posts. He was fascinated.

We’d go out of our way to take varying routes when out running errands – just in case there were different configurations to see for the first time.

James and I even changed the path we took for our weekly walk while big-brother John was in Hometown Music for his piano lessons.

Because … ouchie post.

Everyone was soon in on the act. My parents couldn’t wait to ask “any new ouchie posts?” when they spoke to James on the phone.

And it was impossible to resist adding this artwork to our guest room:

We joked that James might someday study electrical engineering. It turns out, though, it was form – not function – that fascinated the little guy. It was the combination of the power lines and the electric poles that he liked to study. The converging lines. More art than science, really.

James and I returned to that hill in Huntingburg recently. He took this photo to help illustrate the depth of his childhood obsession (I used a weird filter to help accentuate the power lines):

And then, for old times’ sake, James scurried up the hill so we could update the ouchie-post picture from so many years ago:

By the way, James did end up studying electrical engineering. In fact, he graduates with his master’s next month.

But ouchie posts had nothing to do with it.

Please subscribe below and we’ll send you an email notification with each new story.