From Where I Sit

By Pat Spilseth, Columnist

Some days I feel like I’m a walking drug store. My pills for blood pressure and heart, sleep and bone density come in all sizes and shapes. Pink, white and blue pills tumble from my assortment of tiny vials twice a day, morning and evening.   

I’m not the only one. Daily many of us wake to put new pieces into the gigantic puzzle of our life. We select people and events, obligations and frustrations, hope and joys to agonize over, worry and dream about. Our lives are made up of a colorful assortment of people, places, events, even shoulds and shouldn’ts. Each day is another puzzle that needs to be solved.   

Some days the puzzle of life is more frustrating than satisfying. Especially burdensome are the dark days of when I hear about a friend’s illness or death. When winters are icy and freezing, days can be  difficult for many of us in northern climates. 

My solution is to get out a jigsaw puzzle and find where the pieces fit into the picture. The current jigsaw puzzle on my table has too many white pieces of a lake that look alike and too many black and purple pieces of sky…sometimes I need to take a break. I might leave the puzzle in frustration and grab a fresh cup of coffee and a chocolate chip cookie. A taste of sweet chocolate seems to settle my tumbling mind’s confusing frustration…   

The pieces of this puzzle crowded onto the oak table remind me of life. Often it can be a puzzle.

My mom Esther’s favorite way to pass long gray days of winter was to put a box of jigsaw puzzle pieces on the card table in the living room and figure out which piece would form the edges. Edges are the easiest part of a puzzle. The inside pieces are always more difficult, but it goes faster for me if I separate them by color and subject matter.

Other days Esther would sit at the kitchen formica table and play solitaire with a well-worn deck of playing cards. Bent, folded edges made a few of the cards identifiable. That wasn’t really cheating, was it? She’d say “This time I beat the devil” when she won the game.

Now I find myself doing the same things! I’m hooked on endless games of solitaire on my iPad and days figuring out where the pieces go in a jigsaw puzzle. The oak table in our family room often has puzzle pieces laid out on it with a strong light above the table to view the 1000s of pieces more clearly. My eyes aren’t as good as they used to be…soon I’ll probably need to add another bottle of pills for my eye sight. I’m thankful that pills can actually improve my health! 

I do wish there was a pill to improve the sleepless nights I’ve been having. Another sleepless night…too much on my mind. How silly! I don’t have to worry about a job, the pranks of growing kids or paying bills. I didn’t used to worry about silly things like I do now. Nights are the worst, 2 a.m. is the devil’s hour; I think about the politicians running for office, their slurs about opponents and promises of what they’ll do, the fall yard work, friends who are ill, do I have too much or too little Halloween candy, am I eating too much sugar, could I be pre-diabetic… an endless puzzle scrambles my head in the long dark night. I try to occupy my mind by reading or turning on the TV, but late night TV comics don’t make me laugh anymore like Carson and Leno did. They don’t put me to sleep either. Though I go on walks, eat lightly for dinner and don’t have caffeine after breakfast I still lie awake, anxious to fall asleep.  

Does anyone have a solution to the puzzle?

Thank goodness for the daily paper I read at six. It takes my mind off me. First I read about the weather, then the comics. I get a kick out of “Pickles” which has the elderly man and woman teasing each other about memory lapses, who’s supposed to do the household jobs and other issues I can relate to. I scan the obituaries to see if I recognize any names of folks. Lately, I’m seeing more photos and names I recognize. This must be a habit of some other folks. 

Deep down I know I’m fine, just sleepy. I’m certain there’s still some energy and youthful curiosity inside me. Though I no long care to get on a plane to China or Brazil, not even to Mexico or Florida, but I still want to attend plays at the Orpheum, jazz at the Dakota, dinners with my husband and friends. My grandkids are growing and soon I’ll want to see them playing basketball and tennis and play in the band. There’s still some oomph inside this woman…

Life can sometimes be a confusing puzzle. But I’ll find where the pieces fit into my life if I keep taking my pills, talk with my friends, write my columns, attend my book club, bridge group and Writers’ Circle and take a daily walk outdoors. 

Puzzle solved!  Life is good. 

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To contact Pat, email: pat.spilseth@gmail.com.