500 Puzzle Pieces

My grandma used to pick out these elaborate puzzles with 500 (if not more) pieces. It would drive me crazy when she would buy these puzzles from yard sales because then there was an EXTRA hurdle we were going to face. Were all the pieces there? Did someone already attempt the puzzle and give up because the damn cat’s whiskers were going to be the death of them? What if we put four hours into the draining, boring, head-splitting sport of “puzzle making” just to find out we are missing fifteen pieces out of a thousand? I remember staring at puzzles with disgust, more specifically this one puzzle I remember her picking up at a garage sale that must have had a thousand pieces and the box itself was weathered, torn, and smelt like an old book from the bottom shelf of the library. I stared at the entire way home knowing we were going to have to work on it after church that following Sunday. I knew it was going to take hours of flipping over pieces and trying to decide which flower went with what cluster. No TV, no radio, no computer, nothing- just me, my sister and my grandma at the dinner table with God knows how many puzzle pieces. I used to think if she wanted a damn picture of a flower garden, all she’d have to do was say so and I’d print her out a picture that we could blow up at CVS and frame that bad boy all within the time it’d take for us to make the outline of this stupid flower puzzle. Damn I would despise those puzzles and the headache that, naturally, came along with them.
My grandparents had a love like a fairy tale, something only Disney could write. My grandpa loved my grandma more than anything, and vice versa. They went together like the letters of the alphabet, and their love for each other was prominent. My grandparents celebrated their fiftieth wedding anniversary shortly before my grandfather fell ill. I was nine years old and more interested in the cake that was being served at the celebration than any of the ooey-gooey love stuff like the glimmer my grandma had in her eyes after fifty years of being married to the same man. I didn’t pay any attention to the way my grandpa complemented my grandma and how my grandma complemented my grandpa- and I don’t mean with words, I mean with their entire beings. They were made for each other. It was perfect mold- a perfect fit- a perfect couple sincerely made in Heaven by our One and Only. They were perfect for each other. To me, they were my Grandma and Papa but to them, they were each other’s savings grace.
Marriage is hard. Marriage gets harder as the years go on and you replace “date night” with “I’ll do the dishes if you go wash the kid’s hair”. You go from spending an hour each morning doing your hair and makeup to impress your significant other, to literally sitting on the toilet taking care of business while the other one is brushing their teeth while a toddler is demanding a cup of milk from the crack in the bathroom door. You go from making decisions like where you’re going to eat dinner that night or what movie you want to go see with decisions like what bill do we pay with this check and how are we going to make sixty dollars spread for a week? You go from wanting to cuddle at night while watching Netflix to literally passing out on the bed surrounded by clean clothes from the dryer, dirty bottles from the previous night’s late night baby party, and toys from your toddler. You go from flirting and kissing every second you get, to questioning whether or not you’ve kissed your husband in a month. Those sweet good morning text messages you once got are replaced with “Can you pick up milk later” and “Did you pay power?”.
That’s the part of “love” and “happily ever after” that the big screens keep leaving off. The credits start rolling before you even get to the “real shit”. Cinderella and her Prince Charming never fought. Hell, Prince Charming was willing to marry whatever broad’s foot fit in that slipper. Romantic, huh?
Marriage is hard. A successful marriage is even harder. No matter how your wedding day went- no matter how expensive your dress was or what you served at your reception- married couples said “I do” to the same vows that people accepted years before us.
“…. for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death do us part.”
You know what else was hard? That damn thousand piece puzzle from the back roads yard sale that my grandma bought for a quarter. The beginning was fun and we laughed and talked and ate popcorn and laughed some more. My grandma shared stories of her childhood and my sister and I talked about school. Flipping over all the pieces and establishing the outer frame was easy (and fun).
It wasn’t until we started on the “inner” parts that it became hard. Real hard. I cried, I complained, I refused to go on and farther but my Grandma kept making me try and try and try. There were times when it felt hopeless because I just KNEW there were missing pieces. What was the point of putting in all these hours just for their to be missing pieces! I would try to sneak away to the bathroom or just zone out and not even focus on what I was doing, but my Grandma always brought me back. She kept saying we had to finish, there was no other option. It was boring and it was hard, and I drug my feet halfway through it.
But then the end was in sight and everything was starting to “come together”. The bigger picture was starting to make more sense and the beauty of the puzzle started to inspire me enough to keep going. The laughing and the heart felt conversations ensued and before I knew it the joy was back and we were all having a good time.
And then it was complete, and, man, was it beautiful. The colors were so vibrant and you could almost smell the flowers and hear the water rushing over the rocks in the creek. It was a breath taking piece, and it had ALL of it’s pieces.
I asked my Grandma how she knew all the pieces were there, and she told me she didn’t know. She said, “Sometimes we aren’t promised all the pieces, but that doesn’t make the process any more beautiful and meaningful. Don’t wish it was easier. Struggle is required to become stronger.”
Marriage is a struggle, but with struggles comes strength. People looking in only see success, they don’t see the foundation that took years to build to make that success, successful. Hard work, risk, late nights, struggles, failures, persistence, action,discipline, courage, doubts, changes, criticism, disappointments, adversity, rejections and sacrifices are just a few of the “hard things” marriages are destined to face. Overcoming those things and relying on the bigger picture (regardless when you just KNOW pieces of the puzzle are missing) is what will bring you success in a marriage.
Giving up is not an option. For better or worse, remember? It’s time you sit down and start flipping all those pieces over because this puzzle is going to take a long time.

Thanks, grandma.