My 10th Post! Retrospective And A New Year's Message
Dear all,
Welcome to my tenth post! I hope to make it as special for you as it is for me! Such a milestone cannot be ignored, so this can't be just another ordinary article.
When I wrote my first text here, I just wanted to share with you some personal thoughts about the reason why I love chess so much. At that moment I never imagined that so many more would come about so many different topics, nor did I anticipate that they would be so well-received and brimming with positive feedback. Thank you all for your kindness and encouragement.
Therefore, for this one, I want to write something different. Instead of a regular post, I will present a short retrospective on the previous ones. I want to explain what motivated me to write each one, how the ideas came about, what effect they had on me, and also ask you to tell me which one is your favorite. If you have not read them all, that is of course no problem, you can still choose your favorite among the ones you know. You can also click on the pictures to open the link and read them if you want to take a look.
At the end of the text, I will leave a short New Year's message for everyone. Let's get started!
1) Why Do You Like Chess? August 26, 2023.
It all started here. As you can read in the post itself, the idea to write it came to me when I was traveling on the train with a group of friends. When suddenly one of them asked me for my reasons why I like this game so much, I began to think about it more deeply and decided that it would be a good idea not only to write and organize my thoughts, but also to share them with my chess friends, in order to understand what other reasons would come up. And I am glad that I made this decision.
Firstly, due to the positive comments and private messages I received about it. They were all very nice and certainly kept me motivated to write more. And secondly, because I could understand what other people think about chess and how it helps them in their daily lives. It made my admiration for the game even greater.
For that reason, despite not being my most popular post, this one is very special to me just for the fact that it is the first, like the very beginning of a journey!
2) My Top 5 Favorite Chess Players. August 28, 2023.
As I said, receiving so much praise after my first text really motivated me to write more. So, just two days later, I decided it might be a good idea to share with you all who my favorite players are and the reasons why. This topic is very interesting, and I knew that it could generate a lot of engagement, since a favorite player is something that almost every chess lover has, and the reasons for it can be so different.
This post is certainly very special to me. It is the one with the most comments so far, because I think a lot of people enjoyed sharing their thoughts about who they like, almost as a tribute to the players. In addition, thanks to a very dear friend who forwarded it to GM Rafael Leitão, this text received a special comment and participation from him, which made me very happy for days, or actually until today, to be honest.
But I have to say something important: the original list is not up to date anymore. Although the top 5 has not changed, you can guess it is natural that after such a nice action, Leitão climbed 3 positions and today has the 1st place!
3) Building The Chess Dream Team. September 2, 2023.
Possibly the craziest and silliest of all my posts, but at the same time, I believe it can be considered the most popular! I have always enjoyed using my imagination to create absurd parallels, especially in conversations with friends. However, I had never thought that it could be done between chess and football, two sports that are so different, but at the same time that I like so much.
I confess that when the idea came to me and I started to write the draft, I kind of regretted it and gave up at least two or three times, thinking: "Nah, this is too stupid, Vanessa! Forget it!". But it kept popping into my head with another analogy that could be used, so I decided to go all the way and see what would happen. To my utter surprise, the post was very well received and I think I was able to make a lot of people laugh or smile.
Again, it had a special participation from GM Leitão in the comments section, but my favorite part about this one is the controversial inclusion of both Ronaldo, the Portuguese and the Brazilian, which generated some discussion about who is the real one.
4) A Short Medieval Chess Tale. September 14, 2023.
Since the first nonsense was so well received, I thought it might be a nice idea to write another one. Perhaps my favorite book is "The Pillars Of The Earth", and I have always enjoyed medieval stories with battles, tragedies, twists, and drama. So, I decided to write my own chess-based one, taking advantage of the fact that the pieces are already a very direct reference to medieval characters. I honestly think it is the one that took the most time to write and that I changed the most during the creation process.
If you have ever played against me, you probably know that the Italian opening is the main one I play, so I used it to create a scenario that could be described as a real battle. Maybe my writing skills for dramatic scenes can still be improved, but I was so happy to be able to write some references, like the mention of the Sicilian and French defenses, Kasparov's knight on the f5 square, the names of the characters based on my aforementioned favorite book, and many others that I now forget.
Later I wrote a part 2 for it, so this fact alone is probably enough for you to imagine that the acceptance was very positive.
5) Why I Consider Magnus Carlsen The GOAT. October 13, 2023.
If you are an active reader or a friend of mine, you know that I like to be very rational about my thoughts and opinions, trying to understand why I have them and if they make sense. I had always had the idea in my head that Magnus Carlsen was the best of all time, but I had never really gone deep enough to organize my real reasons for this.
Writing this article was really an exercise in persuasion. But not to try to convince anyone but myself. I know that many people may disagree with my point of view, and that is not a problem at all, because that is the best part of the discussion, as long as the arguments are respectful.
Honestly, and not to sound stuck-up, I am very proud of this text, because I think I managed to explain my point of view clearly and in exactly the way I wanted people to read it. Besides, if someone doesn't know me and wants to understand my personality, I think you can just forward this text to them. The way I wrote and summarized my ideas is a perfect reflection of me as a person, and that is what makes it so special to me.
6) Beyond The Board: An Ongoing Journey Through My Life. October 31, 2023.
By that time, I had already written five texts and connected with many of my readers. I even made some new friends who like to comment or send me private messages after reading the texts. With that in mind, I thought it might be a good idea to let everyone know a little more about the person writing it, making our interaction less "professional" and more personal.
Of course, I only mentioned what I wanted you to know and didn't share any information that I didn't want to make public, so it doesn't mean that you know everything about me after reading it. Still, I think it was a nice way to feel closer to you all and to leave a message saying what I think about our lives and the way we see ourselves. This is by far the longest text and I was very happy while writing it, remembering all the good moments of my past and realizing how beautiful my life has been.
Although it is not mainly about chess, I have tried to tell how this beautiful game has influenced my life and what effects it has had on me. So, I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.
7) A Short Medieval Chess Tale – Part 2. November 15, 2023.
As I said, the first part of this story, although not exactly my most popular blog, had a very good reception and many people liked it a lot! One of them was a very dear friend named Harish who almost begged me for a part 2 where Queen Mary Black would get her revenge. I thought about it for a few days and decided that I could use the opportunity to pay tribute to a very famous and beautiful Checkmate pattern.
Again, if you play me often, you know that my favorite variation with Black is the Sicilian Dragon, so I could not choose any other defense to describe the battle this time. Also, the line with the Queen sacrificing herself to complete her mission sounded perfect for the drama I wanted to give.
This second part was easier to write than the first, mainly because of the experience I had gained, but it still had its challenges. I hope you could feel some empathy for the main characters while reading and that the ending satisfied you. If you are wondering, there will be a third and final part next year.
8) Reflections On Cheating: What Makes A Chess Player Do It? November 30, 2023.
Another text that came at the suggestion of a friend. Although it was posted just when the polemics between Kramnik and Nakamura had started, I can assure you that it was just a big coincidence and that it was planned to be written long before. Actually, I don't even consider this text to be exactly about chess, but rather a reflection on human beings in general and what makes us sometimes do the wrong things.
I know it is hard to change the mind of someone who cheats, especially with a text in a small blog like mine, but the main idea was to try to think about why they do it and what can be done to avoid the temptation. If you are an active reader of my texts and have already cheated, I am not here to judge anyone or point fingers. As written, I am not the most perfect example of many things and will not throw stones while my own roof is made of glass.
However, cheating is a line I have never crossed and can swear I will never cross. I especially liked the writing because it was very challenging to try to put myself in a place I had never been before.
9) Chess Where I Lived. Ep. 1: New Zealand. “The Game Of The Kiwis”? December 15, 2023.
This was the very first of a series of five texts I plan to write, so if you liked it, there will be more to come! The main idea is to be a bit more informative than my usual texts. I thought it was important to pay tribute to the countries that I love and that I consider my home, so the way I found to do that is this little project that I hope will be well received by you guys.
The New Zealand one had to be the first, of course. It required some research and I discovered a lot of things I didn't know about the players mentioned, so it was a very enjoyable and enlightening writing experience. I am also looking forward to the next ones because I think it will be great for me to know more about chess and its history. As said, they will be published on the 15th of every month. The next ones will be Germany, Brazil, Spain, and the USA, in that order.
For the third time, GM Leitão participated with his comment and promised to give me some help with the article about Brazil.
10) My 10th Post! Retrospective And A New Year’s Message. December 30, 2023.
Not much to say about this one yet. I just thought it would be nice to do a short retrospective and let you know more about the background of each of my articles. I hope you enjoyed reading it.
Please let me know in the comments which one is your favorite and why. I am very curious and would love to hear the opinions of all of you, also to know what kind of things appeal to my audience the most. Besides, what topics would you like me to explore in future blog posts? Your ideas matter, and I want to write content that resonates with you. Drop your suggestions below, and let's continue this chess conversation together!
If you are wondering about mine, it is very hard for me to decide, like a mother who has to choose a favorite child, because I love all my texts and have a special feeling for each of them. But I don't want to give the impression that I'm sitting on the fence, so I'm going to list my own top 3, taking into account all the aspects that are important to me, such as the fun I had writing them, the reflections they brought, the new things I learned, and how they developed me as a person.
1) Why I Consider Magnus Carlsen The GOAT.
2) Building The Chess Dream Team.
3) Chess Where I Lived. Ep. 1: New Zealand. “The Game Of The Kiwis”?
If you are still here, I want to thank you for reading my tenth blog and express my gratitude to each of you who has been a part of this journey. Your support and engagement have made it truly special. As I look forward to the next chapters, I would love to hear your thoughts. A special thanks to my friend @llsu for helping me create the thumbnail for this particular post.
Finally, I wish you a Happy New Year, full of joy, happiness, love, and peace with your families and friends! Wherever you are, I hope that 2024 will be a great year for you. May your dreams come true and stay positive in case not everything goes well, because life is a rollercoaster and the bad times will make the good ones even more special. If you consider me your friend, you can count on me to help you as much as I can. I am very happy to be connected with so many kind people around the globe.
Warm hugs from me!
Vanessa Bristow
