A “Pool”

When I was a child, someone gave me a puzzle. Twelve large puzzle pieces, when assembled, revealed a western scene in which cowboys were herding frightened steers as lightning struck from an angry sky. i guess there was Some challenge for a preschooler, but what I remember is putting it together many times with family and friends.

My next puzzle memory was in a house on the intercoastal waterway near Navarre Beach, Florida. For many years, during the last week of summer, my in-laws had access to this house from its owner, who worked for my father-in-law. My wife and our young children, as well as other family members, were invited to enjoy that time with them. There was something special about spending time with extended family, playing on the white sand shore of Navarre Beach and fishing off the end of the pier, using bits of sausage as bait. But, when it rained one year, some of the specials started to fail, until someone found a puzzle pantry in a closet.

Every year after that, a puzzle of a thousand or two thousand pieces was kept on a table, and everyone, young and old, was welcome to work on it. This was so much fun, even if you were sitting there alone. There was a sense of accomplishment when you found a puzzle piece that no one else seemed to be able to find. I told my mom about it, and guess what? Cracking also became a tradition on my side of the family. But, as work and family responsibilities took over, after my kids grew up and discovered new interests, and after a hurricane swept the house into the canal, everyone in my family lost their love of puzzles. .

I found it again about a year ago. I bought a puzzle to share with my elderly mother on a visit. We both enjoyed putting it together while talking about just about anything. One of my brothers is very sick. Mom also helped him get started on puzzles, and I made a pact with him and her to trade puzzles that my wife and I have completed every time we visit. My wife and I record our names and the date we finish a puzzle on the lid of the inner box, before we exchange it. That makes no sense. Who cares? But, somehow, it gives us some closure before we break the pieces of a puzzle that took us many hours to put together.

We recently left a puzzle, in the process of being assembled, on the dining room table when our oldest son, daughter, and her husband visited to share dinner with us. None of them could stay away from that! It reminded us of all the wonderful times we spent long ago at the house on the canal. Then, I remembered something about that time that I had forgotten. On one of the first visits there, my son had barely begun to speak. He was learning new words and trying them out. He mispronounced puzzle, calling it “poozle”. We all laughed a lot about that. I am now retired and have decided to put a card table and chairs in a back bedroom of my house. That place will be the “poozling room”.