Lamenting chess again

I once saw it posited that people who have dozens or even hundreds of unread books, yet continue to buy more, are actually using such purchases to codify the pleasant thought that they’ll have time to read them. I think I just did something similar with chess.

I miss playing chess. I miss everything about it. I miss attending chess club meetings. I miss studying tactics and openings in the evening. I miss playing against real people, both in person and on the Internet. The only games I ever play anymore are against Shredder on my phone.

About this time two years ago, I decided I was going to make an effort to play more. So I renewed my membership in the U.S. Chess Federation. It made me happy when I did it.

Now ask me how many Huntsville Chess Club meetings I attended in the past two years? Ask me how many Chess Life magazines I even opened? Sigh.

I don’t like to play when I can’t bring my best self, or most of it, to the game. One of the greatest things about the chessboard is that it is a thoroughly unforgiving environment. I take great pleasure in that when I’m well-rested and sharp, but it’s inevitably frustrating for me when I’m not. I don’t mind losing to a better player, but I can’t stand carelessly dropping one making a mistake that a fresher me wouldn’t have made.

And I believe it’s my inability to produce a critical mass of that fresher me that resulted in my failure to engage anew.

The brutal reality is that we may be empty-nesters before I can really do this again.

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