Chess Yourself

After circling the parking lot, I finally found the unit in Market Place Plaza where the Wilmington Scrabble Club supposedly met every Thursday evening, sharing a space with the Wilmington Chess Club. Twenty-four eyes were focused on me as I walked in the door. The grid of square tables with perfectly placed chairs offered a not-so-discrete place to sit. I looked around and everyone was playing chess- not a Scrabble board in site.

“Are you here for chess?” asked a man who was standing towards the back of the room. I explained to him that I was there to watch and had no intention of playing.

“Well, it’ll be hard to watch from there,” he scoffed. I don’t think he realized I was watching the players, not the game.

The walls were lined with Polaroids of elderly couples and friends who were being honored by their bridge club. Across from the ‘wall of fame’ were two long tables with empty coffee makers and stacks of styrofoam cups. The room didn’t smell like much of anything and the buzzing of the florescent lights was the only sound for the first few minutes I was there.

It took me ten minutes to realize that I was the only woman in the room. There were twelve players ranging in age from about ten to seventy. Each focused intently on the game in front of them, carefully thinking about each move. Their chess ‘boards’ were actually pieces of paper and their pieces were plastic.

Soon, discussion of pre-emptive moves and strategy hummed between the men. They were giving advice to one another. It all seemed to be friendly competition.

A young boy sat at the back, moving his pieces quickly and, I thought, rather naively. A man I assumed to be the boy’s father or coach, took an impatient tone while criticizing his hastiness. The man seemed to believe he knew more than the boy.

“Check mate,” the boy said. I couldn’t help but smile.

On one table sat a wooden set, with beautiful detailing. At one side of the table was a man in his late twenties and across from him was an older man in a wheel chair. The man shook as he reached for and moved each piece. It looked as though he suffered from Parkinson’s disease or had a stroke. He eerily reminded me of my Uncle Billy, who was an avid chess player until he lost all mobility due to Parkinson’s. The younger man was short with him.

“You were just there,” he said loudly. The man in the wheel chair looked embarrassed. The younger man's tone made me uncomfortable and sympathetic for the older man. No one else seemed to notice. Why was he being so blatently rude?

“Did you mean to move here?” the younger man asked impatiently. The man in the wheel chair shook his head no and as deliberately as possible, moved his pawn.

Too often, I see people assume they are better than one another because of frivolous stereotypes based on age, sex, ability, religion, and race. We are all humans and we all have things to offer each other. I just wish we could realize this before humility becomes a disability.