Searching For Bruce Pandolfini
“Don’t move until you see it.”
My top five list of all time films (lists being my thing since before I saw “High Fidelity” and certainly before it came back into the cultural zeitgeist with a brilliant remake) is as follows:
- “Untitled (Almost Famous Bootleg Cut)”
- “La Vita É Bella”
- “The Philadelphia Story”
- “The Fisher King”
- “Searching For Bobby Fischer”
That last one is a personal darling, not only for its parallel to my own competitive history, but for how it displays the desperate need for a parent to safeguard their progeny’s actual childhood and their basic human decency, rather than sacrifice both to their ability to perform, even if that performance would be at the highest level. If it sounds like it echoes my favorite book of all time, “The Little Prince,” and its thesis on the protection of innocence, wonder, and decency, it isn’t a coincidence.
Josh Waitzkin, the chess prodigy in the film, has an uncompromising coach, Bruce Pandolfini, who, at one point deep into Waitzkin’s training, is trying to get Josh to plan his entire strategy from a proposed scenario all the way to victory before making a single move. He’s trying to get him to visualize the path of the game and see how each move relates to each future move, and to script it out before moving any of the pieces. Pandolfini says, steadily and repeatedly, “Don’t move until you see it,” as he challenges the young savant. Waitzkin persists in not seeing more than the move in front of him, paralyzed into inaction by the weight of all future moves and the possibility of losing.
Fed up with waiting, our coach, who has little tolerance for anything other than ability, then quips, “Here, I’ll make it easier for you,” and with a sweeping move of his arm, scatters all the chess pieces across the room to the shock of our tender-hearted Josh. It’s just Josh and his coach, and there’s no one to look out for that soft, sentimental center in this moment. Josh looks back at the board, now twice as invested and pondering the infinite pathways revealed by a single move; and he’s ready to compete, because the fight is all that there is until the game is won or lost.
I had many a protective, anti-victory-at-any-cost force in my life, guarding my emotional core — whether I was performing at a high level or not. There was the best friend who forced me to take midnight breaks from studying to play pinball, the father who never let anything be taken too seriously, and the daughters that never asked me to be anything other than I am (although they do still wish I would hurry up and move back to Austin).
But neither they nor their shielding is what I need, right now. I don’t need to hear their voices, telling me that I am enough, just as I am, that the heart I have is going to be fine, so long as I keep it safe and honor its wishes.
What I need to hear, right now, is “Don’t move until you see it.” And, as luck would have it, I do.
In the absence of an authoritative guide, however, I have to seek that voice out for myself. Prone to grand gestures and hail mary moves, most executed in fits of passion and, more often than not, failing with some degree of amazing, I do not know how to stay still and look five moves ahead. Like a desperate baseball hitter, when I’m trailing, every pitch is all the pitches and life and death hang on each.
When 2020 pounced like it was stealing signs (yeah, it’s too soon for me, too) and knew every tendency I had and every effort I might make to right the ship, it was time for a different tactic. So, without a coach to correct my all-or-nothing approach, I listened to Josh Waitzkin’s coach.
January was ‘kind’ enough to whisper, “Here, I’ll make It easier for you,” before February swept the board clear for me. Friends? Busy and varying degrees of distant. Work? Unchallenging and routine. Plans? What plans?
It wasn’t a total disappearance — I still could see where the pieces on the board were set. But, I couldn’t see the sequence that would lead to a win. That means I couldn’t move. Because the wrong move, or even my typical move (swing big, be aggressive, announce your presence with authority, show them what you’re made of), could lead to disaster. The mighty Casey struck out, you’ll undoubtedly recall.
Instead, I opted for small ball, at least until I can “see it.”
I called it, “No Big Swings” February. I took the dry January concept that captivated many of my friends and applied it to February. No alcohol, so the native desire to go for Herculean attempts wouldn’t unwittingly sneak forward. I dedicated myself to routine, to simple practices, to little victories. With few exceptions (travel, a couple phone calls, a letter), I made no grand gestures. I found some old disciplines and tried not to make them into a walk-off attempt.
I repaired old bridges that were long in disarray. Life became a series of tasks. Control, ever a pitcher plant for me (a story for another time), became my chosen resting state. I entertained going on my life-long dream voyage to escape, and even got the plans laid out in full before setting them aside. I’ve thrown away more of my letters than I’m comfortable admitting, all of which I wanted to send, for all that each was trying to accomplish at once (one of them rang so true, I “threw it away” into a drawer).
No big swings.
“Don’t move until you see it.”
And, last night, on the road back from what was a failed trip north that was just shy of desperate, I admitted out loud exactly what Josh confesses. “I can’t see it. I’m sorry, Dad.”
A mere four days from the end, I was done. Music hurt. The road wasn’t a balm. Cities and company weren’t remotely helpful. The board fully cleared.
I’m still here. No big swings. No abandonment of dry February. I stayed dedicated to routine. It didn’t make it easy to not have the pieces to look at or get feedback from. The path isn’t easy, Bruce. Sacrificing to move forward, putting loss at risk, the uncertainty of what’s to come…none of that is easy.
But, it does suddenly seem easier to see without having to stare Kings and Queens and Rooks and Pawns in the face, to say nothing of their adversarial mirrors on the other side of the board.
I can reconcile with my friends, whom I’ve left in the lurch for years. I can mend very necessary family ties. I can forgive people. I can be kinder to others and to myself. I can wait out one of the most pivotal influences on my life to see if that bond can be reforged. I can strengthen my connections with those who have been waiting so long for me to wake up; and maybe, just maybe, I can even show them something they’ve long waited for. I can overcome my monolithic fears and even my more intimidating past. I can do the things I’ve dreamed.
And I’ve almost played enough small ball, arguably for a decade and definitely for the past two months, to be tied against a most terrifying rival — myself–who has been kicking my ass for years.
I see it, Bruce. And maybe it’s time to finally make a move.
(Edit: Just in case you need to see it for your self. It’s actually two clips, but don’t watch the second one unless you’ve already seen the film or you’re never going to watch it.)
(Spoiler alert. Last warning.)
