Puzzling

Puzzling

Edy and I went to a silly movie last night and enjoyed seeing the planetary displays as we strolled home in the warm breeze afterward. Today was a mellow day too with yoga and some shopping then a really nice dinner at a place we like that serves stone crab. We supplemented with Blue Crab and Shrimp to be sure we had plenty of shells to pick through. Yum ! The only downer was the piano player. He played piano ok, but the mumbling/singing and techno-composition of the classic selections left me shaking my head…..I tipped him anyway.

We tend to go toward the intense and deep around here as you know and discussions of late have been in keeping with our “take no prisoners” way of addressing topics. Sure, we might dance around things for a bit in deference to “feelings”  but there is never a doubt that if something is UP it will be addressed and then strained through the required numbers of finer and finer sieves to glean the nuggets we all really want in the end, despite our cringing throughout the process. We all do it in our own way and would expect nothing else from each other.

While the kids were here, thousands of pieces of puzzles were combined to make some pretty complex images. Grandson #1 is very good at this and devoted hours and hours of focused efforts at each one. His dad helped on a few and Edy and did on another until we were on one of the last multi-hundred piece ones that was too complex and the pieces too tiny to complete before it was time for him to head home.

As Edy and I sat on either side of him one afternoon offering “help” I thought that this is a perfect marriage building tool for couples to use to see where they stand as a unit. That then got me thinking about life and puzzles and puzzles as life. I then started to think that having all of these shapes fitting together to form an image goes contrary to pure creativity that one would do if given a ball of clay or a pencil………………..…..anyway……….. I digress.

 Puzzles are fun. I’m only now finding that out. In my other lives I could not sit still to do one for more than 5 minutes. This past week I had much longer stretches and looking forward to finishing “The Masterpiece” with Edy (notes WILL be taken).

The brain is an amazing tool. It can easily identify multi colored patterns and complex shapes, differentiating subtleties and nuances to find the “required piece” at particular times. Other times it feels like the “factory must have screwed up” because the required piece “does not exist”… only to appear later and be place as in a trance …………such are my thoughts and emotions about life questions at any particular moment.

Sometimes an entire area can be constructed off to the side that looks like it should go to another image entirely, but once it’s placed in the framework and melded with its neighbors reveals its purpose to the whole with elegance and certainty.  It’s like every piece has its place!!  How novel.

There are a few topics that I have resisted writing about in these blogs. Three big ones are kids, dogs and drunks for various reasons that will reveal themselves. The topics are charged and kind of painful but thanks to six year olds with determined focus, I was able to find a place for a few pieces of my own puzzle that I did not think would ever fit.

Not so puzzling after all.