Slash and burn!

I enjoy revising.

Ooh! A shocking assertion, to be sure. Sometimes I feel "done" with a piece -- good, bad, or ugly, it's time to move on and maybe use the brighter glimpses of it for another (hopefully better) piece one day.

But usually I sense that something's amiss. Perhaps too much information, too little, not enough coherence, overclarification, etc. Perhaps fragments that don't really make sense, such as the one I just wrote. And thus I sit down, as I did this weekend, and stare at the document for a long while.

In some ways revision can be almost as daunting as writing a fresh piece. Sometimes the same despair creeps in: What am I going for here? Is this even salvageable?

On Saturday, though, some distance from the paper made it much easier to see where I could insert more research. I referred to specific overuse injuries common to gymnasts. I developed some of the other stories -- those of Kerri Strug and the experiences of my teammates. As much as we outwardly grumble about writing on the board (but, of course, inwardly love it), I've found that breaking down the readings into sections, and then analyzing those sections further, has given me a better sense of the structure to aim for in my own pieces.

I'm hoping I'll be able to pull the chess piece (my topic for the third paper) together in a satisfactory manner. I can see several stories: mental v. physical sports, the role of a women in sports, the simple challenge of playing the game. The second draft may very well end up being one huge mess. But hopefully it'll be a mess I can work through.

In the meantime, I've been focused on revising Assignment Two. I hit page 16 and realized that there's still much more to write. The paper feels better already, though: more universal, more connected. To be honest, I'll likely need another revision after this one. I'll probably have to cut down, though on what specifically, I can't tell just yet. Whenever the "research-y" paragraphs threaten to dominate the pages, I've tried to insert dialogue -- which, of course, serves to make the piece longer. But I feel that the story is starting to move somewhere else -- somewhere better.

It is raining right now and I feel nothing, really. A bit tired. A bit of heat from the laptop. A bit thirsty. A bit annoyed. A bit "I'm going to kick some ass." A bit "I know I won't really kick some ass."

A bit of nothing, really. My mind and I have been wedded for so long that anything on the verge of appearing interesting right now is shrugged off. All right, I guess.

I liked playing chess last night. The game finished almost an hour and a half after beginning due to instructional breaks and sips of Arnold Palmer.

"Non-linear," I repeated at one point, picking up my pen to write down the note.

Mike sighed. "I'm going to need patience."

My king danced around the board for a solid twenty minutes. He refused to get captured. Sort of like me in many things, I think. Losing but holding off the final moments, waiting for a breakthrough, a miraculous mishap, anything.

I liked having to think in all different directions, none of which would really mean anything in the end. But they did right then. It was so incredibly pressing that I move on this diagonal and not on that one. That I advanced up the side. That I stayed put and discovered a defense that I hadn't realized earlier.

I challenged Steve to a match:

"hahahaha is that what you needed help with???"

Well...yes.

"sounds reasonable."

Then later,

"P.S. Jay told me that he saw you at the library...practicing chess. I laughed. At you, naturally."

It's on, Steve. It is on.

I don't really care if it's on or not, though. It will be something to do. Something to write about.

It continues raining, something falls to the floor in another room, and I'm still here with not much of anything.

Sport?

As I trotted out of the library the other day, chess books in hand, I had a sudden thought : Is chess a sport? After all, it would be quite disheartening to write a glorious fifteen-page story on the beauty of chess only to find out "'tis but a game, good child, not a sporting endeavor."

Then the question shifted: What is a "sport"?

As with all questions that require an answer, I turned to Wikipedia.

"Sport is an activity that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often engaged in competitively."

I suppose that settles the issue.

But what about "competitively"? If you and I go head to head in some impromptu drinking game, does that justify our activity as "sport"? Laser tag? Kickball? Mario Kart?

What about exertion? If I play Solitaire to beat my previous time and you're competing in a triathlon, are they comparable sports? Does mental exertion matter as much as physical? Are they equal or will the physical always be more appreciated?

A friend argued once that sports which require judges are NOT sports due to their subjectivity. Of course, I vehemently disagreed. What sport isn't subjective? Hello, referees. (I then proceeded to storm away and fell down as I turned the corner, making a particularly effective argument for why gymnastics is a sport.)

Today, I passed a flyer in Van Hoesen advertising some sort of mystical class called "Writing Sports Literature." One of the black-and-white images on the yellow paper was a chess piece. I'm not skilled enough yet to identify which one, but it may have been a pawn or rook.

But the grainy image was all I needed to see. Through whatever definition you wish to use, chess qualifies as sport.

Notes

"What about the perspective of the pawn?"

Chess seems to be a solid task to tackle for the third paper. I've never played, so immediately I have more distance from the game than I would with track, gymnastics, lacrosse, etc. Dusty volumes from the 1950's fill a shelf section on the third floor of the library. Hits immediately jumped up from my search query, "How to play chess."

There's got to be a story -- or make that stories -- in the midst of this.

As I teach myself about the rules and wonders of chess, I'd like to set down some of the random facts I'm discovering on Wikipedia. (No worries, kids, I'll confirm all of these facts.)

"Chess can be played with a time control. This involves assigning each player a set amount of time to make moves. If a player's time runs out before the game is completed, he loses on time. The timing ranges from up to seven hours for long games to shorter rapid chess games usually lasting 30 minutes or one hour. Even shorter is blitz chess, with a time control of three to fifteen minutes per player and bullet chess, in which the allotment is under three minutes."

Seven hours!

"Introduced into the Iberian Peninsula by the Moors in the 10th century, it was described in a famous 13th century manuscript covering shatranj, backgammon, and dice named the Libro de los juegos.[6]" -- Yeah, Spain!

How about that? The queen is the most powerful piece.

Chess clubs formed in Europe and chess problems were printed in the newspaper. I've actually seen such problems in Newsday, though I never made any attempt to riddle through them.

Many male champions. Why do the men and women have separate championships???

(Clearly the chess scene has been waiting for me to join the circuit.)

"Chess moves can be annotated with punctuation marks and other symbols. For example ! indicates a good move, !! an excellent move, ? a mistake, ?? a blunder, !? an interesting move that may not be best or ?! a dubious move, but not easily refuted." Fabulous.

Stay posted as the adventure begins. Checkmate.

steps

I walk the streets of Japan
'til I get lost
'cause it doesn't remind me
of anything

I like to walk.

In the morning as sun strikes my eyes and my quads grunt against the incline of the hill. A song plays in my head, something inappropriately peppy for this time of day, and I think that perhaps the sun will make everything warmer later -- less sharp -- less inevitable.

I like to walk in the afternoon -- almost a run, really -- here, there, towards, away, rushing, thinking, scarce attention to a raindrop or a crack in the sky. Someone calls my name and I blink and wave. I walk quickly although I am not always late. On crutches, in leg braces, with foot boots to protect broken bones, I pass people. People with two solid legs and a leisurely gait. In the snow. How is that?

I prefer to walk at night, looking for cracks in the sidewalk and keeping my mind on the stars. I imagine myself flipping down this cement aisle. Sometimes I want to break into a run. No reason at all.

I let myself walk right now.

Sometimes I hear music. Often I imagine conversations. I wonder what you're doing beyond the hills.

I do not want to keep up with someone else's pace. Sometimes I call people. Multitasking, if you will, panting a bit as I turn corners and move up and down.

But I prefer to walk alone, even though I am not walking towards someone. I do not need you as a goal. I have enough myself. I am getting there, you see, moving from this one to the next. On my own.