Wednesday March 4, 2015
Sit with me for a minute as I replay my interactions and
contemplations after spending a little time with Josie on a 100 piece “Sleigh
Ride” puzzle after lunch today.
J: (spreading the
puzzle pieces around on the coffee table she cleared herself for the project)
Ok. Now what do we do first.
M: (picking through the pieces, laying edge pieces to my
right) First we sort out the edge pieces.
So when they have a flat edge like this, they go over here. They help us put the picture together inside
of the edge.
We worked for awhile getting the pieces placed. Josie occasionally would get impatient and
grab a piece from the middle section and try to fit it in. I explained again to her the purpose of the
edge and helped her work to place the pieces.
Once we had the frame completed, there was a little celebratory dance on
her part.
J: (collecting pieces she recognized as the horse and sleigh)
I want to put the horse together.
Even though she had the majority of the pieces, this took her
a little bit of effort. And there were
pieces that only had a shred of the horse’s nose, or were majority snow with
part of the lower legs, which weren’t as easily picked out. Still she diligently sorted, oriented, and
placed the pieces together. Meanwhile,
while looking for horse pieces, I put the pieces that I initially thought might
fit with hers together, revealing a snowman’s broom. We’ve done the puzzle enough that I know
where the horse section fits into the frame.
As the five-piece long section snapped into place, Josie let out a big,
“Wahoo!” and a fist pump.
Still there were a lot of pieces sitting waiting to play
their part in the picture. My instructions were this: it has to snap in easily
and it has to fit both picture and shape.
That’s kind of abstract. But your
little sister is kind of amazing.
Sometimes she’d hold a piece, certain it fit where she wanted to
progress on the picture. Occasionally I
had to assure that though the piece had a place, we just didn’t yet have the
pieces it fits into placed. She
trustingly laid that piece aside and picked up a new one.
Josie and I spent about 30 minutes putting this puzzle
together. There was a little
frustration, but there was a lot of celebration in high-fives, fist bumps, and
“Good job!” and “you did it!” exclamations.
I realized that this puzzle project was a metaphor to our
search for truth. The gospel is our
frame, the edge pieces that border our understanding. We have some elements of the puzzle which are
easy for us to put together, even our favorite parts of picture. The Book of Mormon and the temple come to
mind, I know how to make a picture snapping these pieces together. Most of the time, I even know where they
connect to the frame. Sometimes we think
we have pieces that fit with one element, but we find they actually belong with
another. Then there are other beautiful elements that challenge us; pieces we
have to try again and again, even where we’re certain we’ve already tried
them. And at the end of the puzzle, when
there are two pieces left to manipulate, they go in right where we had tried
and tried before. We don’t have to see
the big picture to know it will be beautiful and complete. We don’t have to know where every piece fits
right now, only that we are making progress.
This is how my faith sits today: Mosiah 4:9 Believe in God; believe that he
is, and that he created all things, both in heaven and in earth; believe that
he has all wisdom, and all power, both in heaven and in earth; believe that man
doth not comprehend all the things which the Lord can comprehend.
I love you, Riley. I
love that you are helping people in a distant land put some pieces of life
together. You are blessed to know what
you know.
Love,
Mom
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