A game of chess, anyone?

I've begun to realize the truth in the age-old cliche, that life is not all that different from a game of chess. Every possible move in chess can be mapped out the moment the game begins. While it's not possible to map out our lives the same way, it is possible to envision repercussions...to imagine the ways in which rows upon rows of dominoes will fall.

It is not possible to predict the future, but it is possible to predict possibilities. No harm there...is there?

Just like life, most people go all their lives without learning chess. Just like life, people who finally sit down to learn the game almost always get check-mated the first time. The difference is that chess, for all its seriousness, is only a game...life, sadly or otherwise, is not. The other difference is that chess is alternating patches of black and white, and yet life has those pesky shades of grey in between, doesn't it? Those surreal shades of non-deterministic grey, that we all have an intuition for, and yet very few can actually quantify.

We're all players out on a giant chess board of mottled black and white and grey. Don't we owe it to ourselves to learn the game?