The Open File - Tip of the Iceberg

The Open File

by Life Master Mike Petersen (Zug)

Tip of the Iceberg

There is a general consensus of opinion among non-chess players that the game is a dry mathematical exercise that attracts stuffy, boring people.  If only they could get a look inside the head of a chess player who is sitting down to play a tournament game.  What would they see if they could look through those eyes and sense those five senses?  Well, any one of us can answer that one.
 
Fear.  Intensity of purpose.  The feeling of sweaty palms.  Butterflies in the stomach.  And all of this before even one move is made.  Then, during the opening phase, there could be a couple of reactions.  One is relief, assuming the opponent is playing something familiar.  The other could be enhanced anxiety, assuming an unfamiliar opening or some other fear, whether real or imagined.  And as the game progresses, there will be peaks and valleys of furious mental activity, depending on the position.  Wouldn't it be interesting if we could wire someone up to an electroencephalograph and correlate the readouts to the game score!  I'll bet there would be enough material to cause some enterprising soul to write yet another chess book. This one might even be interesting to those same non-chess players mentioned earlier.
 
All of this activity is hidden to the average person who might be watching.  All they see is the tip of the iceberg. What they see are two people hunched over a pile of little wooden idols staring and staring and staring.  They see general inactivity punctuated by occasional shifting of positions and the off-moment flurry of activity when a piece is actually moved.  Most of the drama never comes to light.  Once in a while, a time scramble will ensue, and that will be the only action the uninitiated will ever see.  Maybe that's why they call 30-game chess "Action Chess."  It's the only time non-players ever see what they call action, at least as they define the word.
 
So, don't ever expect anyone who doesn't play chess to understand that you can lose five or ten pounds in a tough weekend swiss.  Don't expect anyone at work to understand why you are exhausted on Monday after the grueling tourney over the weekend.  Why should they?  All you did was sit and push little pieces around a board!  Don't expect anyone to understand at all.  Let them stay in the non-playing world where chess players are those strange beasts devoid of any emotion.  And whatever you do, don't try to explain to anyone over lunch how you had the tourney won except for the mistake you made in the Poisoned Pawn Sicilian in the last round.
 
Unless, of course, you don't mind eating lunch by yourself.

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