Let's play a game called Guess What This Is
64 Squares, 32 players, many directions being pulled, thousands of possible moves, black and white, slow and strategic, and definitely with a time limit.
If you said a game of chess you are correct but boring...c'mon be more creative than that. Okay well how bout this?
Life!
Yes, that's right I think life or at least mine of late is like a big game of chess. A novice chess player, I know a bit about the game and last night started thinking that all these decisions and moves I have to make are so similar to those a game of chess would contain. I'm not too sure at what point in the game I am (part of the problem), but what I do know and fully understand is that it is my move.
You've heard of master chess players that will play like a hundred people at one time and just go up and down the line moving their pieces, you've heard of that right? Well imagine you're that chess player.
The whistle blows and you start with your first game, easy right? You move a pawn forward or a knight up and in, something basic. You probably do a similar move in the next 99 games. Now you're back at the first game and the opponent has countered your opening move, like you, they probably just moved a pawn or something like that. These simple moves continue for oh, maybe like the first 4, 5, 6 moves. In life this equates to the simple decisions; when to eat, when to sleep, going to grade school, you know the stuff everyone does.
Then the time comes when you need to start deciding which pieces to attack. In chess it's simple taking their rook when they're going to kill one of your pawns no big deal right? Making an aggressive attack up the middle, while your opponent just moves his knight in funny 'L' shapes along the sides. Who cares if that crazy 'L' shape ends up taking your queen or worse...(insert scary music here) THE KING! It's chess they are just pieces, so what. Unfortunately in life who knows you may need that pawn later on down the line.
Alright now you're at move 20, the room is smokey, your brain is throbbing at the intense focus needed to maintain these 100 separate games at the same time. The clocks are ticking the seconds away waiting for your move, the man across the table from you has the most ridiculous Burt Reynolds mustache you've ever seen (didn't see that one coming did you?). Your hand grabs the piece, you've got your move, the perfect one, wham you set the piece down and grin confidently at the Reynolds impersonator. As you turn your back and head to the next table to make your move there, you see the guy at the last table immediately counter your move and take a key piece. You go back to look--of course why didn't you think of that? You're supposed to think a few moves ahead of the current one right? So you continue on, but now you second guess your decisions, the clock's tick seems to echo in your ears, when at a particular table you are constantly thinking back five, or six tables ago...was the move the right one, has he already countered? Now the boards are getting confused in your head and it all begins to unravel. Luckily enough you are a skilled chessmen (I assume that's what a chess player is called) so as you may have lost some of the games you still have plenty left, and plenty that you've already won.
Now I think this is the point I'm at. I've won several games, lost several, but the majority of them are laid out in this big ominous line that seems to give me tunnel vision every time I look down it. As the rounds progress each move is riskier, each thought is more complicated, and each mustache is bigger and darker than the last (I'm in tears making myself laugh about these mustaches). So what's my next move, the pawn, the rook, the knight, ooohh how bout a castle with my rook and king? Who knows all I know is that I'm up and this damn clock keeps ticking in my ear, so I gotta make my move before my timer runs out.
It's not all bad though right? I mean how complex can my life be if I make mustache jokes in my blog? So I guess I'll continue to grab the pieces and make moves, not knowing if they're the right ones or not. Who knows maybe next year you can call me a chessmen!
I will leave you with a song I made up while making my sandwich for dinner tonight.
My bologna has a first name,
it's K-R-O-G-E-R
My bologna has a second name,
it's V-A-L-U-E
Oh I love to eat it everyday,
And if you ask me why I'll say,
Cause Kroger Value has a way with C-H-E-A-PEEEE!
