The power of touch

Something weird happened this evening; I wish I'd videotaped it.

We went to my in-laws to have supper with our niece who's in town just for the day. My father in law is in the end stages of lung fibrosis and isn't expected to be around that much longer. At the end of the evening, when the others had left, my wife and I were setting up an old intercom system of ours so that her dad could summon her mom if he got into trouble. (He sleeps sitting upright, with oxygen, in a room at the other end of their suite.)

There's a "call" button which sets off an alert on the other unit; we had it working and then we had him try it. Nothing. There aren't any "buttons" actually, the call button is really a metal touch pad, which works like those touch lamps.

We try to figure out what's wrong. My father in law is exerting plenty of pressure, but nothing happens. We surmise it might be because of callouses from working with his hands for years, but then something weird happens. His finger is still on the touch pad, and I touch his other hand to see if maybe he's too cold or something. The call alert activites, and a little light turns on.

We try it again--same thing. My wife gets the same result by touching the back of his other hand.

Somehow even though his body isn't producing enough charge, or capacitance (according to some sites I looked up that explain how these sort of switches work), he can still conduct the charge from one of us when we hold his other hand, and we're not particularly close to the switch.

I don't know why he was the only one it wouldn't work for. He's had serious heart problems as well as his lung trouble, and the heart is the electrical engine of the body. Perhaps that's it.

What is interesting is that there is enough of a "charge" available in our touch that it passes through another's body and can then trigger something that person is holding. Could all those clichéd love stories not just be metaphorically talking about the jolt that happens when two lovers touch? Could there something more than the psychological feel of touch that gives it its therapeutic value? Could we be wired to give each other an almost imperceptible jolt on contact?

It was a lighter moment as we face the inevitable, and it made me curious.