Chess

I love studying chess more than I like playing it, which sounds odd. Chess as a concept fascinates me. Taking control of the center board. The intense concentration. The thousands of hours needed to become good at it. Opening chess theory. Middle game theory. End game theory. Chess notation and being able to recreate famous games played a century ago. Modern savants. Ancient masters. The breaking of minds. The making of champions. It is rich and it is beautiful.

Am I good at chess? No. I am a blunderer. There will come a time when I make a silly mistake. That is the weakest part of my game. I have an excellent opening game but a weak middle game. My end game is a one-trick pony. But I find myself reading about it, taking lessons, watching chess matches. I guess people love watching and analyzing baseball and do not play, perhaps it is the same? But when you get asked if you like baseball, nobody asks if you play. But if it comes to chess, they ask what your rating is on chess.com. My rating? Absolutely abysmal. Atrocious. Bottom basement. Embarrassing to even mention. Yet I keep at it.

Will I be good at it? Maybe as much as an amateur golfer is who finally breaks par on a course he plays every weekend. But maybe that is good enough.