The Wringer Incident

The middle 20th century was a pretty cool time to be a kid. Rather dangerous, but not so much so if a kid was smart. I wasn't always that smart, but when my stupidity did raise its ugly head, my smarts kicked in fast to get me out of whatever trouble I had gotten myself into, as was the case when I tangled with a machine recently arrived in the house when I was three.

Mom noticed my focused interest in it and cautioned me never to touch it. I think I reached out right then and there and touched the thing's big tub. Mom watched me defy her advice but didn't scold me verbally. She just shot a hard look at me more powerful than any words.

Over the days after its arrival, I watched her operating the thing with no small amount of enthusiasm. She had done more than her fair share of laundry without a washing machine of her own and was clearly enamored with its capabilities. As was I. Especially the part of it used to wring excess water out of the freshly washed clothing and bedding and towels and such. The wringer fascinated me more than most everything else I had access to around the house.

So one day when Mom was busy elsewhere, I manage to get up on a footstool and start fiddling with the wringer. It was a hand cranked model. The only thing electrically powered on the thing was its noisy agitator, a mysterious element I could only hear when in action–a thumping, chunging, slooshing bangarang of reciprocating gears and sloshing, sudsy hot water. I ignored that and avoided the buttons I had seen Mom pushing to get that part of it operating, knowing it was noisy enough to promptly bring her running to the scene of my crime. No, what I wanted to fiddle with was the crank handle of the wringer. It fascinated me.

Watching Mom guide washed, dripping-wet swathes of cloth between its rollers while vigorously cranking its handle made practically every drop of water squirt right out of it all. I wanted to know how hard those rubber rollers had to squeeze to make that action happen.

My tiny fingers probed along the surface of the rollers, top and bottom. Then along the length of their point of contact. And at some moment of time as I ran my fingertip along that squeeze span, I had reached with my other hand and grabbed the crank handle. And then I had pulled it toward me. The index finger probing at the rollers was caught first, not very painfully, but the pressure placed on it was enough to startle me. Reflexively, I yanked at the crank more upon sensing that pressure which pulled the middle finger tip into its grip, too.

That's when panic really kicked in, but I knew not to let that reaction cause more badness, so I immediately let go of the handle and used my free hand to pull at the other one to extricate it. No dice. The rubber rollers clung tight without remorse for what they were doing to a toddler's little bitty fingertips. Instant insight to my predicament was that the only way of escape was to somehow separate the rollers just enough to loosen their cold, uncaring grip.

I could hear Mom, in the kitchen now, preparing stuff for making lunch. Bowls ringing out upon being pulled from their place in shelves. Utensils clinking and clanking likewise. So I had some time to pause and just think through my situation if I could manage to keep my mouth shut and not let mounting panic seize control of my tense, tingling set of vocal cords.

Looking along the top of the mechanism, I saw something that looked like it was made for easy gripping with one hand. A sort of bar occupying about half the length of the rollers. I cautiously reached for that and carefully pushed at it. Nothing. Pulling produced no good result either. So I lifted it up just a bit, heard a light click, and presto, the pressure of the rollers eased completely and I was able to yank the trapped fingertips away without injury.

Dropping the bar, I scrambled off of the step stool, put it back where it belonged, and sidled away from the machine without looking back, wanting nothing more to do with the thing. I finally told Mom about the incident sixty-seven years later, a confession she appreciated.