I posted earlier today that I’m not in Chess Mom mode; Chess Dad took Alexander to his second chess tournament.  I received a happy call from Alexander after every game who proudly proclaimed that he lost but had fun.  The final round was supposed to start at 2:00 pm our time; the phone rings at 2:03 - surely the game wasn’t over that quickly!  Chess Dad asks “what does a full-point bye mean?”  I explained that Alexander had a bye for the final round and instead of the typical 1/2 point that is awarded in the event of a bye, Alexander was receiving a full point.

Translation:  Trouble.

For anyone familiar with Asperger’s Syndrome, you know that change is not exactly a welcome event.  Routine is the name of the game and this is most certainly the case with Alexander.  He had an expectation of playing four games.  This expectation is not happening.  What did happen, is a meltdown.  Chess Dad quickly called back and said “you have to talk to him, he’s freaking out” to which I hear Alexander yell “I’m not touching the phone!”  I told Chess Dad to put it into numbers; Alexander likes numbers.  I said to explain to Alexander that there is an odd number of players so every week someone gets to sit out.  If there are 99 children, there are only 49 games.  This week he’s special and gets a point for just showing up.  I then followed up with a joke - “If that doesn’t work, just carry him out of there.”  I guess that is only partially a joke as I’ve had to carry both of the kids (on separate occasions) out of places before.

I feel bad for Dave as he doesn’t have the thick skin that I do with regards to rude comments from onlookers.  Hopefully Alexander takes it easy on him and just has a mini-meltdown.

I somehow managed to talk my husband into taking my son to today’s chess tournament.  My husband does not like crowds and new situations.  We’ve played around with several online autism screening tools and he always scores quite high on the “maybe an Aspie” tests.  I even had him fill out The Ritvo Autism Asperger’s Diagnostic Scale that I picked up from Dr. Ari Ritvo myself.  Yup, scored really high on that one too hehe.  In my house, the apples don’t fall too far from the tree - or their dad in this case!

Anyhow, I digress.  Today I am not a Chess Mom - today my husband is a Chess Dad.  Good for him getting involved with the kids’ extracurricular activities.  Last week while the kids had dance class guess who was there by my side - yup, daddy.  He is a wonderfully involved dad and the kids idolize him.  He works long hours as a planner/engineer type for a local cable company; should he make it home before the kids go to sleep the second that garage door opens, the kids scream and come running.  That’s love!

So today I am not a Chess Mom.  Today I am a stay-in-my-pajamas-and-read-books-to-my-daughter mom.  I like this kind of mom, really quite relaxing.

I knew I would never be a soccer mom; I tried the tee-ball mom thing for a season and that didn’t work out either.  As of today, I am officially a chess mom.  At the urging of the coach of the chess club at my son’s school, I took Alexander to his first chess tournament today.  He was in the K-3 under 600 category and come in as an unrated player.  His first match was against an adorable and equally shy little boy that looked to be 5.  About 20 minutes later Alexander came out and gave me a big hug.  He told me “I got checkmated.”  I asked if he had fun and he did; he wasn’t sad just happy to see me and said he was ready to go again.  So we waited for the second round.  Mind you we are out in the cold as there is no inside waiting area for parents.  I snuck away during the first round and purchased a chair at CVS and thankfully had a Spiderman blanket in the trunk of my car.

Round two and after about 25 minutes Alexander came out with a big smile on his faced and proudly exclaimed “I got checkmated again!”  Yay for the smile.  We went to lunch; it was a rather quiet lunch, anytime I’d try to engage him in conversation he’d tell me “I don’t know what to say.”  I told him no need to say anything we’d just enjoy our food.  We made it back early so to keep warm we engaged in a friendly game of chess.  The room he was in had 40 chessboards setup so we had our pick.  We chose an end spot and he chose white.  About ten minutes later, with a few helpful moves on my part, he had me checkmated.

The third round was the marathon round.  I thought he certainly fell asleep in the room and outside had it not been as cold I’d have nodded off.  Finally after 45 minutes he comes up and tells me that the round ended in a draw.  Fantastic, Alexander score 1/2 of a point!  We killed about 20 minutes talking to other parents and then the pairings for his last round were posted.  He was up against a boy who’s parents were the other ones there with a Spiderman blanket.  The parents and I chatted a bit as we had many things in common aside from the last-minute use of a fantastic Spidey blanket.  Their son was 0-3 for the day, he was also six, this was his first tournament, and he was also shy. 

About 30 minutes later the parents and I peeked in and noticed that the majority of the board was cleared.  The chess coach for Alexander’s school is the same for their school so he went in to give us an update.  He came out to explain that Alexander had a King and two Queens (thanks to a promoted pawn) and the other boy had a King but was on the run.  The coach explained that he would be surprised if it didn’t end in a draw as it is hard for beginner players to corner their opponent.  About five minutes later the other little boy came out with a dejected look and his face and Alexander was right behind with a smile - he ended up cornering his opponent and came away with a win.  One and a half points to Alex!

There is another tournament next week and then after that the state qualifiers begin.  The qualifiers are five game tournaments and as long as a child earns two points in a single tournament (there are five different ones) then they qualify for state.  I have added a new category to my blog - Chess.

It is official, I am now a chess mom.

Last month my son attended his first chess club meeting; chess club meets for an hour before school on Friday mornings.  That was his first, and up until today only, chess club meeting.  They went over the names of the chess pieces and the allowed moves.  That weekend my son and I played chess and I was surprised at how quickly he picked it up.  The second week of chess club the instructor was double-booked so there was no meeting.  The third week the instructor was MIA so there was no meeting.  Last night the new instructor, Coach Leo, called to confirm that yes he would be there this morning.  Sure enough, Coach Leo was the first person on the scene.  Alexander is now attending his second chess club meeting.

In these past few weeks we’ve been playing chess,both over our LAN and with the actual board. He gets a little obsessive with the pieces on the board and will kind of zone out as he lines up the pieces he’s captured so LAN play is a bit more productive.  I am obviously worse than I remember and he’s better than I gave him credit for - if I don’t pay attention he’ll beat me.  Our first LAN game ended in a draw.  I barely beat him the next two games and that was with me playing to the best of my ability.  I love how he’s fine when he loses a strategy game like chess.  Last year we were playing the game “Sorry” and as he realized he was losing he leapt over the board game at me like a lion after an antelope and attacked me.  Losing at chess he just says “let’s play again.”  Whew, I’m not in risk of bodily harm.

So this morning while waiting for the custodian to open the library up for chess club, Coach Leo mentioned a chess tournament that is being held tomorrow.  We’d have to register Alexander with the American Scholastic Chess Federation but would receive a magazine as well as be ranked nationally.  In the tournament he would play with other children in 1st - 3rd grade that are also beginners.  The only requirement to play in the tournament is that they know the rules of the game.  Four games are played and it is a zero elimination tournament, all children get to play four games.  Alexander’s eyes widened upon hearing of the tournament and he proclaimed his desire to go.  Seeing him enthusiastic about something is really great so it looks like I will be spending my Saturday in a waiting room with other parents of chess lovers.