This essay won second place in the New Jersey State Federation of Woman's Clubs Creative Writing Contest in April 2009.

The Meaning of Life, As Found Through the Rubix Cube

I took a Rubix Cube away from one of my ninth grade boys on Friday. They're obsessed with them. They can solve them in about five minutes, but they really don't understand that a Rubix cube has no place in the English classroom, particularly mine, so that is how said Rubix Cube came into my possession.

As I sat at the doctor's office after school that afternoon, I decided not to bring in a book or a magazine to read, or grading to do. I decided that, well, if my ninth graders could figure out the Rubix Cube, so could I. I mean, I have a Master's Degree. How hard could a Rubix Cube be?

The answer is hard. Very hard. However, I waited an hour for the doctor, an hour attempting to figure out the key to solving the Rubix Cube. Did I get close? No way. I did, however, end up getting eight of the nine green squares on one side, with the ninth green square on the opposite side of where it should be. In addition to this great Rubix Cube accomplishment, I contemplated the meaning of life through the Rubix Cube.

When Mr. Rubix or Mr. I-want-to-drive-English-teachers-all-over-the-world-crazy or whoever it may have been created the Rubix Cube, he had life in mind. That is why it is so damn hard. Just when you have almost all of the pieces in the right place, you realize that one piece is wrong. In order to find the perfect spot for that piece, everything else has to be mixed up and pieced back together again. Properly. You hope. And just when you complete all of the peices on one side, you realize five more sides still have to be pieced together properly in order to work, and you weren't even worrying about those sides right now, but you have to fix them if you are to be successful. And in order to fix them, you have have to mess up what you just peiced together. But you can't ignore the five other facets, not forever at least. You can always take the easy way out. Look the answer up on the Internet or give it to someone else to solve, but that's exactly that: the easy way out, it's not your own accomplishment or achievement, and you can't expect anyone else to solve it for you. You must solve it yourself.

And, like I said before, I was not able to successfully complete the Rubix Cube, not yet, at least. One side, almost pieced together properly, the rest, just waiting to be fixed.