Chess choice

Chess is about choices. Defend or attack, wait or push, make the piece exchange or not. I’m not very good at making the right choice, however I recognise that’s what it’s about. My first chess memories, which are not my first games, are with my grandfather.


We made a regular 1 hour drive down to see them when I was young and in my pre high school chess curious phase. It was formal at Grandma and Grandpa’s house, handshakes at the door and saucers under the tea cups. Presumably I once blurted out something about chess in an attempt to fill an extended silence and next thing I knew I was only 8 squares away and eye to eye with Noel Neild. This was the Noel who fought in World War Two, once won a Victorian championship in old school (wall style) handball and successfully made it to the top of the public service as an accountant in post war Canberra. Scanning his life from my position in history, it’s hard to image some of the choices he’d been required to make.


We played and he promptly shwacked me off the table like I was small rubber handball or a single page of departmental acquisitions. Check mate.


I headed home with my pawn-tail between my legs.


The next time we visited I wasn’t invited to play, instead I was handed a freshly acquired ‘how to play chess’ book and a comment to the effect of ‘you might enjoy this, read and we’ll play next time.’ I did, and we did. It was a similar, no quarter given thrashing from Grandpa. Respect, I suppose. That’s one way to go.


My father directly empathised and recalled his chess induction 40 years earlier. It was harsh, but also what’s the alternative? Let the learner make mistakes and then move on without learning. Perhaps? We went home and Dd and I began a years long series of handicapped games. After each game, the handicap would adjust 1; dad would lose or gain a piece for the start of the next game.


We’d both play to win, I’d just have a 3-4 piece head start most games. It was a compromise that I always thought was great. A good choice for a healthy contest. Equity rather than equality.


It’s chess season in our house right now. There is a guide book on the dinning room table and I expect there is rook on the floor somewhere waiting to ambush me on the way to the bathroom at 6:15am. I’ll start the next game with my boy down a Queen, a bishop, a knight and a rook. The choice of how to play is clear, we’ll both be going for the victory, I think perhaps grandpa would have approved.