Connecting the dots

Dear Life-Puzzler,

Remember those connect-the-dots puzzles you enjoyed when you were young? I loved those - you connected the lines and then colored in the image they made. I would beg for books of them. I loved it when I could guess what they were ahead of time, but I also loved it when it remained a mystery and the anticipation of knowing built up as I went.

Google them and you’ll see they are still a thing; there are even very complex ones for adults. I remember that New Yorker used to do dot to dot jokes sometimes. Usually the image the joke would create was fairly obvious and that was part of the joke. I particularly recall one that had dots without either numbers or a caption. That’s the one I selected for today’s image. Notice that it has the feeling of having a discernible pattern. Which is part of the joke.

As mentioned, one of the things I enjoyed about dot to dot puzzles was seeing if I could guess what they were before I started to draw the lines from number to number. I usually could - I found that by staring with soft focus at the dots I could see a pattern and if I felt into that pattern I would start to get a sense of what it formed.

I then began to notice there was a feeling I had when I first started to get an inkling of what a particular puzzle was. I liked that feeling, it felt like a trail or path appearing, one to follow. It seemed I could set my foot on that path in a light or delicate way and, in following it, it would often open to a discovery. That’s probably my first conscious remembrance of following intuition. Though I didn’t know it was that at the time, of course.

There were other fun things I did with my dot-to-dot pages. If I thought the image was a bird, for instance, I liked to start the drawing out of order, perhaps with number 17 instead of 1, to see if I could arrive at the bird in the picture in a different way - essentially, in a non-linear way. I enjoyed that too.

At some point, I started thinking about the people who made these dot-to dot pictures. Could I make my own, I wondered? So I started doing that, experimenting with the pattern of dots needed to create a cow or flower or house so I could draw it from one dot to another without lifting my pencil.

I even created random pages of dots and then tried to create images and scenes by connecting dots. That’s what made the New Yorker joke so funny to me when I saw it years later.

Making my own puzzles lead me to look for the patterns that created the shapes and forms of things around me. From there, I grew in my ability to see the connections between things and people and - as I matured - between thoughts and ideas, actions and consequences, between questions and their answers, between problems and their solutions.

In a way, life is one big dot to dot puzzle, isn’t it? We follow from one thing to another, sometimes feeling we know what the big picture is, sometimes not. Sometimes attempting to create one picture but ending with another. In effect, though, we lay down lots of dots along the way, creating our picture as we go. Interesting.

I still enjoy pondering connections, there’s a lot to enjoy there, I’d say. And to benefit from. Connecting the dots is probably my go to problem-solving tool. It’s also one of the best exercises for seeing the unseen worlds. Or for bringing something into physical form. It is a very interesting thing to ponder, wouldn’t you say?

As we near the end of a year, I find it useful to create a pattern of dots by jotting down a few key moments and aspects about the year and then considering what overall pattern I see in the connections between them.

I also like to do this around a challenge - like my teeth saga for instance - or regarding a period of years, such as my 12 year WalkAbout. Looking back in this way, I glean understanding and perspective I don’t gain as easily otherwise.

So here I am, pondering away about this as we enter the last month of 2023. Perhaps you’d like to join me by pondering the shape and form and meaning of the pattern that was 2023 for you.

To happy pondering,

~ 💖 Mayet Leilani