IN "Poozle"

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

My next puzzle memory was of a house on the Intercoastal Waterway near Navarre Beach, Florida. For many years, during the last week of summer, the owner, who employed my father-in-law, gave my in-laws access to this house. My wife and our young children, as well as other relatives, were invited to enjoy this time with them. There was something special about spending time with extended family, playing on the sugary sandy shore of Navarre Beach, and fishing at the end of the pier, using pieces of sausage as bait. But, when it rained a year, some of the specials began to decay, until someone found a pantry of puzzles 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 a lot of fun, even if you sat 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, and guess what? Bewilderment also became a tradition on my side of the family. But, when work and family responsibilities took hold of me, after my children grew up to discover new interests, and after a hurricane washed away the house on 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 ill. Mom also helped him get started with the puzzles, and I made a pact with him and her to exchange puzzles that my wife and I have completed every time I visit. My wife and I record our names and the date we finished a puzzle on the inside lid of the box, before changing it. That makes no sense. Who cares? But, in a way, it gives us closure before breaking the pieces of a puzzle that took us many hours to put together.

We recently left a puzzle, assembled, on the dining room table when our oldest son, daughter, and her husband visited us to share dinner. None of them could stay away from him! It reminded us of all the wonderful moments we spent a long time ago at the river house. 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. I was learning new words and trying them. He mispronounced the riddle, calling it “poozle.” We all laughed a lot about that. Now I am retired and have decided to put a game table and chairs in a back bedroom of my house. That place will be the “poozling room”.