~ Earlier this year I returned to chess… the study of chess that is, and as a result, I became hungry for the tournament life. But as you would know it, we had a little situation called Covid. So, what I did instead was to rejoin the US chess federation and decided to read and study master games and get back into it, waiting until the tournament's return. I couldn’t believe it had been nearly six years since I dropped out of competition. Too many things had piled up in my personal life, preventing my participation, to even consider talking about. Let’s talk about chess. As spring emerged this year and Covid wore on, I moved into my new office and studio, unpacking a mountain of boxes. I found more than a dozen forgotten boxes containing chess books, equipment, software and nearly everything I had collected since 1969. I picked up a copy of Alekhine’s “Best games of Chess” and a chess set and began going over it that night. The fire was rekindled. Studying chess for about 2 hours every night before going to bed (if I even went to bed) became the norm until the present time. So, now we arrive to the place where I was in a tournament playing chess once again. I was eligible to play in the senior tournament because of my wrinkled birth certificate. I entered and played. It was a very good time.

This blog is getting quite long… I do believe there will be a Part 2 where I’ll tell the story of my not-so triumphant return. It was for me, a very satisfying experience. I’ll leave a little mystery about how I did, but I truly felt great.