Have you ever spent hours on a jigsaw puzzle, only to find that a piece is missing?

Purchasing puzzles from a thrift store is an inherently risky life choice. I can’t resist buying them because they are such a bargain, but I always know there’s the possibility that I might be getting slightly less than the advertised 1,000 pieces. In my mind, it’s a worthwhile risk, because missing pieces don’t bother me too much.

For you avid puzzlers out there, you might be wondering, “Erin?! How can you be so nonchalant about missing pieces to a puzzle? Doesn’t it just infuriate you, knowing that you’ll never be able to completely finish the picture?”

No, it does not infuriate me. It makes me smile. It reminds me that life is wabi-sabi; there is great beauty in imperfection. That we’ll never have everything we want. That we will all experience great loss. And that life can still be beautiful with the missing pieces.

Last year, I completed a very difficult 997 piece puzzle that I purchased from a thrift store. (Lo and behold, three pieces were missing at the end of the multi-week project.) My right-hand man initially expressed disappointment when we discovered our plight. But then I reminded him of the book of poetry he gave to me, and my favorite poem within it.

There is no solution to grief.

It is not a problem to be solved or a task to be completed.
It is an unfinished jigsaw. A puzzle with a piece perpetually lost.

You can still tell what the picture is, but there are details missing.

Like the sky missing a cloud or the ocean missing a wave.
It is still the sky.
It is still the ocean.
But it is quietly incomplete.

This is still life.
But it is missing a piece. A piece you will always long for.

And there is no solution to your puzzle because that piece was shaped to
your jigsaw – to your life, to you – and you will never replace it.

It is irreplaceable because it was shaped uniquely by love.

So it is ok that you’ll never quite feel full again.
It’s ok to know that you’ll never feel the true satisfaction of completing the puzzle.

This is still love.
It is still life.

It is just quietly incomplete.

-Becky Hemsley

I am an avid puzzler. In addition to jigsaw puzzles, I enjoy New York Times puzzles, puzzle books from the checkout line, building IKEA furniture (which I can say from recent experience, felt like a puzzle at times), spending years studying overly complicated mathematical equations in order to pass my actuarial exams… (Well that last one wasn’t always enjoyable… but I did enjoy it far more than the average person would!) I’ll stop the list there. I enjoy challenging my mind. And I love the rush of pride and accomplishment when the puzzle is solved.

But there is one puzzle in my life that will never be finished: grief. There have been times over the last two years when I’ve fallen into the trap of thinking about my widowhood like a puzzle to be solved. I would ask myself questions like:

• How can I enjoy [insert fun activity] as much as I did with Stephen?
• How can I remain the person I was with Stephen?
• How can I stop having the hard days when I feel utterly despondent and helpless?

And after much mulling over these types of thoughts, I now have the answers to them. (Spoiler alert: they probably aren’t what you want to hear.)

• There are some things I will never enjoy as much as I did with Stephen. Because he was exceptionally funny and joyful, and my all-around favorite human.
• I cannot remain the person I was with Stephen. Widowhood forces growth and evolution. Change is inevitable.
• I will always have hard days. I’ve learned to dance through them, but they will never completely go away.

And that’s what life with a missing puzzle piece feels like. You accept that the piece is gone and will never be found. And you learn to see the beauty in what remains. If I can offer a small bit of advice to those who are grieving, read this poem over and over again, until it seeps into your bones. There is no solution to grief.

I’m going to go do a puzzle now… One that can actually be solved. 🙂