Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

• Galatians 6:9

but those who hope in the Lord
    will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
    they will run and not grow weary,
    they will walk and not be faint.

• Isaiah 40:31

But as for you, be strong and do not give up, for your work will be rewarded.”

• 2 Chronicles 15:7

“Be very strong; be careful to obey all that is written in the Book of the Law of Moses, without turning aside to the right or to the left.

• Joshua 23:6

The title needs an explanation.  I was taught to never quit.  If I was to fail, I must go down swinging.

But the puzzle in the photograph is now on it’s tenth day.  It is supposed to be a wildlife scene.  The duck in the upper left is missing a piece.  Below the duck are two groups of pieces of the male moose antlers.  Nothing for the female moose.  The eagle in the upper right is more than half done.  Between the two birds are the antlers of the elk, very little of the body of the elk.  There is supposed to be a black bear in the lower left, but all that is there is an ear and maybe three partial feet.  Then the deer are in the lower right.  Legs and bits of the stag’s antlers.

I am usually done in five days.  The hairpulling with the Peanuts characters took about seven days.  But this one will take a long time.

I will search and search.  I will place one piece into the puzzle, and then I will mutter.  “Quit while you are behind!”

If I don’t, it might be another thirty minutes before I find a piece that fits.  I might do the single piece a few times a day, but it is going to take a long time to finish.

Why do I use the “loser” anthem?  The jigsaw puzzle was supposed to be a mind clearing activity that is calm.  That way I could take a break from the writing and clear my head.  But if I got frustrated in doing my mind clearing activity, the writing would be the mind clearing activity while I fretted over a puzzle that was taking far too long to complete. So, I have a single piece of success and then I walk away before I get obsessed with the puzzle.

Note: I have only had one puzzle that I never finished, but I was only trying to help my son.  While in Europe, I bought a 5000 piece puzzle of the Night Watch by Rembrandt van Rijn.  It was so big that my Dad made a special board for him to work on it.  It was too big for our dining room table at home and my son took the puzzle to my parent’s house while he was going to college.  Can you imagine over 4000 of the five thousand pieces that were all black and cut almost the same?  After about a year of trying, some of my son’s cousins, not to be named, messed with the puzzle, so we knew some pieces were already lost.  It was never finished.

I was a secondary worker on the project, but that was the only failure.  The puzzle above will be finished.  It will just take some time.

God will give me the strength.

Note: The puzzle was completed on day 15. A lot of pieces looked like they belonged somewhere else, but I did not fall prey to the adage of the first mark of insanity is to keep trying the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.