getting creative

Boy has it been a while since I was here…only (a little less than) three weeks left in this semester. Hopefully it all ends with all of our limbs (and minds) in tact.

I decided to get creative and write a little story; enjoy!

A several month old Sudoku puzzle sat on his desk. He sat there staring at the boxes with numbers, trying to make sense of it. He’d always been good at the puzzle- he took great satisfaction in seeing how the patterns worked and figuring it all out.

He had found the puzzle in a bus station a few weeks previously and decided to work on it- even though it was already months old at that point. Things were going smoothly as he started, numbers falling into place, everything making sense…

Then, all of a sudden, it stopped…no matter what possibilities he played in his head, the numbers stopped fitting, The puzzle that he thought he knew, that he thought made sense, had become this incomprehensible jumble that, at this point, frustrated him.

The more he thought about it, the less it made sense. How could something that had made so much sense previously, that seemed so tangible, so achievable, just stop being so?

He had put it aside numerous times- hours, even days. Yet, when he came back to it, he could find no answers, no solace in the puzzle. But, for some reason, he always came back to it- thinking that another look, another attempt would give him the combination he so desperately sought.

Unfortunately, he saw nothing. The frustration turned to apathy. He began to wonder why he even bothered with the puzzle in the first place. A wave of disappointment came over him. What the thought he knew, he didn’t…so what did he know?

So he thought, “One more look, maybe that’s it.” He gazed down at the gray newsprint, but nothing clicked. He drew a breath, picked it up and threw the puzzle away.

“Why frustrate yourself with what you can’t figure out?” he thought to himself as he walked away from the trashcan.

This time, the puzzle held no answer for him.

-MJH

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