The aboriginal jigsaw

This was the very special jigsaw which got the house going on jigsaws, thought previously to have been rather childish, by both FIL and myself, probably only fit for those in their second childhood. After FIL had done this one we both knew better.

The puzzle was a birthday present for FIL, a jigsaw made from an aerial photograph centered on the house in Exminster where he lived for near 50 years. Sufficiently artisanale to have several very non standard pieces in the middle, in particular the one containing the house.

As befits a jigsaw first assembled by an elderly gentleman, one piece is missing and shows up nearly yellow just below the centre of the puzzle. And four or five pieces from the left hand end of the top edge are somewhat the worse for wear as a result of a coffee flood plain, having separated out into two or three layers each. We are considering whether to repair them or whether to store the damaged pieces in a separate bag as a memento.

Started with the edge in the usual way. Then the motorway, which was easy. The motorway for which FIL was nicknamed 'Motorway Dick' as a result of his leading the campaign to stop the then thriving asylum being chopped in half by the motorway - with his own home finishing up underneath. Hence the hump in the motorway as it passes to the north of the village - a hump for which there was a considerable bill but which has served to contain northern expansion. Then the railway cutting across the top right hand corner of the puzzle, with Exeter above and Dawlish below and to the right. Then the by-pass running just to the west of the railway. Then the lane - Days-Pottles Lane - running along the bottom of the puzzle

The village itself looked a bit daunting, so did the various brown fields next. (One can understand how black and white photographs taken in tricky circumstances during the last war might have been quite difficult to interpret). Then the asylum - now housing for people who work in Exeter, very much in the way of the Epsom asylums. Then the border between village and field. By this time there were few enough pieces left in the heap and enough pieces in the assembling puzzle just to pluck out likely looking pieces from the heap and place them.

Not being my village, I did not have much momentum on this one, except towards the end when I thought I was slacking a bit too much and wellied it a bit.