There's more than meets the eye in jigsaw puzzles
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Last week I had a chance to watch Bethanie Wood, the placement student with The News, at work. She took the photos of Tillsonburg Senior Centre Singers that appeared in Friday's edition. You can see the top of my head, first chair second row on the left.
Ms. Wood carried out the assignment with aplomb, and her photos are excellent.
Her photos in a feature on The Carroll Trail, Page 12 and 13 of last Wednesday’s edition, in subject matter and composition can't be beat.
Our show is coming together well. Hope to see you on the 26th of April.
Since we can't roam the area too frequently, Martha and I have turned, or returned to assembling jigsaw puzzles. Some folks consider this a great waste of time. We don't, and here are some reasons.
First there's the rush that comes with each piece successfully added to the developing picture. Probably the most enjoyment comes, not from getting the final piece in place and admiring the result, but in talking over memories of winters past when we spent family time gathered around a table searching for the next piece of the puzzle. My memories run back though our own family experiences to the house I called home for the first couple of decades of my life.
A favourite scene took place in the parlour. Mom and Dad Bowes and sister Gretta were down to a handful of pieces of a pretty large and challenging picture. Oh oh, there's a piece missing! Dad rummaged in a pocket of his jumbo-knit sweater and proudly inserted the last piece.
We assembled puzzles at the cottage at Sand Lake, too. Some especially pleasing ones we glued to veneer and hung on the walls.
To locate a particular piece it's good to look very intently at the opening you want to fill, and then as you scan the scattered bits, keep flicking your eyes back to the hole. It forms an after-image on the retina and frequently the sought after bit of cardboard jumps right out at you. This strategy gives both shape and colour clues.
I was reminded of a course in life drawing that Martha and I attended in Simcoe many years ago. Babe Wannamaker was the instructor. He employed models to sit for us, youths, senior citizens, some nudes. Babe encouraged us to glance from the model to the sheet of paper and simply trace the after image.
The range of age of our sitters brought to our attention the changes that occur as we age. In normal living those changes occur at glacial speed. Well, glaciers have revved up since then, but you get the picture.
We are jerked up short about these fleshly metamorphoses at class reunions, funerals, sometimes weddings. I hear people saying "You haven't changed a bit!" I wonder about that. Are their memories that out of kilter or are they simply trying to make folks feel good? I guess without Babe's tutelage I would be as unaware as others appear to be.
As the years spin by I more and more have to beg someone's pardon, "but can you help me with your name?"
Did you know our earlobes and our noses never stop growing over a lifetime?
Our course ran through the coldest part of the winter. We felt sorry for our nude models. Their flesh tones took on bluish shades as the time passed. Babe would call a recess to let them wrap in a blanket for a few minutes.
And so, back to the jigsaw puzzles. They exercise our minds in figure/ground recognition, and colour nuances. They keep arthritic fingers more supple. They keep our thoughts off the latest scandal, disaster or new strains of influenza and the nuclear posturing of Kim Jung-Un.
And while we scan for the next piece of the puzzle I can rehearse the words and melodies of the songs we are polishing to perfection for your enjoyment on the 26th. Although Martha only puts up with a certain amount of unaccompanied bass.