My Worst Moment OTB

Right after the aforementioned game, the score stood at 4.5-2.5 (in Lewis' favor). Since he was the incumbent champ, all he needed was a draw over the next 3 games to tie the match (and remain champion).

But somehow or other I managed to win the next 2. And so it all came down to the decisive 10th game (and I was White!).

Here's the way things stood after Black's 46th move...a piece of cake, right? Fortunately for me, my king gets back just in time to protect the f-pawn. But then it takes one step too far--eek!

I remember feeling a great giddy sense of unreality while I was making those last moves. I mean, I was actually going to be school champ! Toppling the mighty Lewis in the bargain. Holy crap!

It was a strange sort of disconnectedness which I can only remember feeling OTB one other time: during a game at Paul Masson where I was a piece up and simply froze and seemingly was unable to come up with another move (and so lost on time on move 37).

Anyway, back at the high school club I heard--I think I may even have felt--my opponent let out a great relieved gust of breath in response to my folly. Very much like the Krakatoa blast, and no doubt every bit as pungent (had there been no walls in the way, it may well have encircled the earth, or so I could've imagined at the time). At the same time you could practically feel the air go out of the room as the handful of spectators went trudging off to their fifth periods (for my opponent was fully as arrogant as he was good, and most everyone wanted to see him get knocked down a few pegs--especially by a lowly freshman like myself!).

That mood of unreality I found myself in continued however; I simply refused to see what was right in front of me (and which I had somehow or other managed to fall into like something out of a Three Stooges short): "Wait--wait--" Hand out as though to conjure up some amazing resource (perhaps a piece hidden under a trap door beneath one of the squares!). Finally my opponent let out, with something very much akin to disgust: "If you don't take it, you lose."

My notes from that time give a more conventional account of the whole business: "My stomach curdled when I saw his reply." Oh yeah, and I also--with typical adolescent assiduousness--listed LITERALLY EVERY SINGLE MOVE by White that might've served to preserve the win.

Of course, it occurs to me now that I couldn't have timed it all any more perfectly (even if I'd been trying to!). Indeed, if you ever need a camera-ready "CHOKE!!!" meme, look no further than my example. ;)

I remember skipping my afternoon classes for the day and heading home early. It all made for a most unpleasant walk, I must say.

To this day I have no idea how I managed to do that. I mean, I wasn't even on drugs back then! :D