Do You Play (shiver) “Connections?”

It makes no sense. A New York Times word game that causes many players to tear their hair out, might actually be healthy? But the popular new puzzle “Connections” could be the very thing to help us escape this chaotic planet, even for a few minutes.

Here’s what this online game is about: you start with a grid of sixteen seemingly random words and must connect four of them together, until you have four “correct” rows. Each time you try, you’re told if you succeeded, didn’t succeed, or get that dreaded “one away.” Drat. After four failed tries, you’re kicked out. The four rows go from easy to difficult and if you’re expelled, they show what you missed. Here’s an example…

Like anything in life, practice helps. You learn how those dastardly Puzzle editors at the Times think. (For example: “blow, bumble, fluff, spoil = things that mess up”).

It also helps to be young sometimes, especially if one of the rows is the first name of Hip-Hop stars or popular Rhianna songs. Pop culture left me long ago.

One time, the final, hardest row was “green, yellow, white, blue = the colors of the Brazilian flag.” Say what?

However, despite the trauma and headaches, I’m now addicted to Connections. It’s part of my morning routine, like the crossword, or Wordle. It helps me start my day with “brain yoga” stretches.

I even believe Connections gives three great benefits…

It puts you in the moment. This world can be painful and goes at a blistering pace. Anxiety and depression are going through the roof. I find myself skimming the headlines as fast as possible (that’s all I can stand) but spending the next twenty minutes doing puzzles. Like many people in the world, they take me out of the violence, cruelty, and destruction. Connections, with its need for focus, imagination, and fortitude, comes in handy.

It teaches you to think differently, even backwards. Is “bat” here a verb or a noun? Aha! There are four kinds of flowers listed. But wait, there are five. If I guess the wrong four ones, I’ll use up a turn. (Here was a hard one recently: “beat, charred, leak, and pee = words that sound like vegetables. Get it?”). Yes, groan, but that was the hardest row. (Here was an easy one: “bore, drag, drip, dud = party poopers”). Don’t worry, it gets easier, the more you do it.

You connect to other Connections buffs. My mom Marilyn, cousin Ellen and aunt Ann compare scores each morning via text, sharing the ins and outs of our frustrations and torment. Some days we all proudly share our results. Other days it’s like we’ve been through a battle together, none of us victorious. Sometimes one of us will emerge the champ while the rest of us are left scratching our heads.

Let’s face it, Connections is an escape. And judging by its popularity—and the many videos and memes touting its frustrations and pitfalls—Connections somehow, yes, connects us.

And maybe that’s the game’s greatest benefit.

 

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