Jigsaw Puzzle

I like words. I enjoy fitting each word into a phrase that helps what I am feeling make sense. Creating a sentence is synonymous to a jigsaw puzzle in which only the correct pieces fit together. Inside each individual word is another small puzzle of sorts. My life, lately, has been like the synthesis of words into a complete phrase. The pieces have been arranged and rearranged until they fit. Unlike the puzzle pieces, which are inanimate and unfeeling pieces of matter, rearranging the different pieces of my life has caused some pain and discomfort. I have wanted to stop the building of the puzzle, but I could not stop because then there would be a hole where substance is supposed to be. I was not even able to take what someone else had already begun to put together and add to it-though that would have been easier. Instead I had to start from scratch with the first piece. I had to begin building and discover along the way what pieces make up me. Just as in a real jigsaw puzzle, I began with the edges, knowing that sometimes that is the easiest thing to deal with. As each outer layer was built, I worked my way in to where the pieces began to form that which is at the very core of me. What I had not realized as my puzzle began to be built is that sometimes it is easy for the puzzle pieces to get mixed up if there are similar shapes. Sometimes good enough is still not right. I had a puzzle piece that I had been trying to make fit, but it would not fit because it was only similar in shape, but not the right shape. In order to keep building this puzzle I had to find the right piece to put in the right place. All of that twisting and turning, and all of the hours of building finally left me in a state of completion. Though there are cracks in a puzzle even after it is completed, no one pays attention to the cracks because the finished masterpiece is what catches the eye. By no means is my masterpiece all the way completed because I expect that a shift in the positioning of the puzzle may call for some adjustment. I know that sometimes in the process of being built you have to be broken down. Puzzle pieces have to be flipped, turned, and sometimes exchanged for other pieces. What you thought would fit may turn out that it cannot, and you have to rebound and find what works. Such is life. The building of a puzzle can be frustrating but the purpose is clear-in the end there is a finished masterpiece.