Can you tell me? While other people indulge in other activities, what is that, you like to engrossed in a chess game.? What other people think about you?

There was a chessboard in the game closet, and I was 6 years old.  I was facinated by the pieces.  They were mysterious little plastic trophies or something.  There where so many! I tried to find pairs- two white horses, two black castles. I wanted to make up stories that went with them.  Stories about blood and honor.  Stories about truth and mistakes.  The pieces just seemed to hum and hint at things that I couldn't undrestand.  My mother saw me playing and (doesn't this happen with most chess players) she told me to go ask my father about them.  He taught me the rules (all except for capturing en passant) and played with me when he could spare the time.  I loved the game immediately.  It took me about 2 years of five or six games a week to beat him.  When the tides turned in my favor, after about 20 straight losses- he shook my hand over the board for the last time save one.  That one is special and it is a secret.  So in a round about way to answer your question: when I play chess I am lifted.  Lifted way from the world of people into a world of geometrical phantasmagoria.  A world of strange, illusory lies and biting, absolute truth.  Chess has a way of hypnotizing you and surprizing you.  As you learn more and more about the game it becomes more and more beautiful.  The horizon of complexity recedes into the distance and I stand amazed.  When I play chess I am a fool on a raft in an ocean of joy, enlightened by reason and lost at simple and marvelous play.  

What do people think about me? I don't really care, but I bet they would say I'm creative, intelligent and and kind.  Thanks for asking.

I liked the game the minute I saw it, which was at primary school.  All I remember about that was the pieces and board were red and black.  I was however no good at it. 

Slightly later I encountered Chess again and it was the same thing, I think I was about 13 at this point.  Nobody in my life played the game and my interest was fleeting. 

It wasn't until I hit 18 and realised I wanted to learn how to play it.  Oddly enough reading Lord Of The Rings encouraged this idea, there are several references to Chess in there, I guess the book was indirectly involved. 

I got one of those Kasparov electronic boards and took it from there.  It whipped me relentlessly on level 1 for a while, never forget the day I beat it though.  In a few months I could beat it on its maximum setting. 

I only had 3 live opponents to play in my social circle and I dominated my games.  When I wasn't playing them I'd set up the Kasparov board and Battle Chess which I had acquired for my computer.  Playing 2 games at once my game just got better and better. 

I've been playing now for 18 years, for the last 6 of that I play every day. I'm not as good as I would like but I find that I win 70-80% of my games online so I'm happy with that.  I do hate getting beat (who doesn't?), but I have a good attitude to it.  I'll take the game apart and see where I went wrong, then just chalk it up to experience.  Can't win if you don't know how to lose. 

Not sure what other people think of me in the general sense.  As for Chess I ran out of live opponents years ago, the best of which refused to play me again, stating that I had 'went onto another level'.  On the one hand this is good but it's also quite sad. 

Actually there is one guy who still plays me OTB but his game is really bad, he doesn't seem to learn from his mistakes.  He does however love the game so I don't mind taking the time out to play him. 

I've toyed with the idea of going to a Chess club for OTB games but the fact is I don't need to.  I'm not interested in competition, just the game.

 centerhunter and  DMX21x1 thanks for sharing a heart touching descriptions. You are really of sharing nature and have good human qualities.Now i tell of mine. When i was of around 14 years i was drawn by the chess because of an uncle of mine was in love of chess and sometimes forgot to take his lunch and dinner while playing with guys in our neighbourhood. His wife and his childs always complained that he is so mad about chess. And i was also drawn , but i had no money to buy a chess set so i drew it in a plain paper the 64 squares and stuck it on a cardboard and used old cells and buttons and stones in place  of the pieces and played a game of chess  with my younger brother that night and it was the real precious moment of my life. That was the happiest moment of my  life.

A coherent post up until this point. If you don't want to play league matches or whatever, going to a club means you meet other people who love chess so you can talk about it and play some games with them.

I knew how to move the pieces for a long time but I didn't start playing often till 7th grade. my teacher would bring it out with other board games for us to have something to do during days there was bad weather and we could not go out to play. I won most of the time but I wanted to slaugther them so i kept playing chessmaster 4000 on its hardest mode at home and trying to figure out what it was doing to make it so strong.  ending up creating my first opening setup that no one there could come close to beating xD i dont use it anymore as it takes good sqaures away from my knights but none of us where really good with the knights anyways at the time.

since none of them knew to fight for the center i could get that setup done almost all the time. And I did start slaughting them so I started playing online slowly kept improving.