The cube

By Gabriel, age 11

“Yes! PR!” I yelled as I got a 14 second solve. Wait. Let’s rewind a little bit.

It was June of 2021, on the warm, stuffy front porch. We were bored since we couldn’t go anywhere. “I bet that I can learn to solve that thing in less than two hours,” said my dad, pointing to the scrambled rubik’s cube on our shelf.  “No way he does it,” I thought. “How much,” my older brother Milo, asked. “How about five bucks,” my dad replied as they shook hands. About an hour and some 59 minutes and 59 seconds later, my dad shouted, “Done!” His triumphant eyes humor my heart. My hands. My bones. He had really done it.

Although I didn’t know it at the time, that was the start of my cubing journey.

The next day as my dad was returning from work, I asked him to teach me how to solve it. Although I didn’t know it at the time, that was the start of my cubing journey. We made flashcards to memorize algorithms (sets of moves). Every night I practiced. The making of the layers, improving times all belonged to me. I learned new methods and persevered. At last, it paid off. I went to my first competition and let my fingers fly.