Lost: 2 queens and a bishop
Found: Washington Heights, 181st street en route to the Hudson River Greenway
There's a very long story involved here, but basically I hate chess. Primarily, that's because when i was eight years old, a kid named Jimmy Hasenbein announced to our entire families at Thanksgiving that I had said 'shit' while we were playing outside.
Now you're probably wondering if anyone said to him, "Well I hate to split hairs, here, Jimmy, but you just said 'shit' at the dinner table."
And the answer is no. Nobody said that. It is to this day a great disappointment to me that neither myself nor—more glaringly—the adults at the table had the wherewithall to deliver a comeback like that.
And the only other time our family went to the Hasenbein's for dinner, Jimmy beat me at my first chess game and I was pretty much scarred for life regarding chess from that moment forward.
The other reason I hate chess is because people are constantly suggesting we play at really weird times, such as when I'm right in the middle of trying to having fun.
But here I am, in New York. And there is literally chess on the streets. And one thing I'm learning is that if you think you're going to get away with merely having fun, or if people aren't going to call you out for cursing at Thanksgiving tables, then you're wrong. You've got to constantly think ahead. And I'll admit, I'm enjoying it somehow—in the twenty-some-odd years I've been hating chess, I find myself participating in some more abstract version of it: It's street chess after all.
But I look forward to a place in time where I'll completely relax again, and in the meantime hope there is some justice in the world, namely that Jimmy Hasenbein, all grown up, will someday read this blog and realize what a dick thing that was to do.
