When I was in high school (Servite High School in Anaheim, California), I was on the school chess team. Our team — Bob Smith, Tom Law, Tom Quackenbush, Dan Musser, Ed Hernandez, Dan Musser, Dennis Michel, and Mike Ventriglia — was very strong and we won the Orange County championship in our junior and senior years — arguably the de facto State Championship.

We had four players with near-Expert rating strength and a couple with probably-A rating strength. Other schools sometimes had one Master strength player, but those schools couldn’t beat us in a five-board match. For example, Marina High School (Huntington Beach) had Kim Commons (1951-2015), who was a very strong Master.

But then came college, and grad school, and work, and family, and more work — and there was no time for chess for the next several decades.

Well, now I have time and so I played in a local chess tournament on a recent weekend. Four of my games had an interesting tactical sequence, and one game in particular had the longest forced checkmate I’ve ever played — forced mate in 11 moves.

I have mixed feelings about chess. For young people, it teaches planning, risk assessment, mental calculation, sportsmanship, and other good things. But it requires many hundreds of hours of practice to advance beyond beginner level, and some of that time might be spent better on other tasks. And for some people, chess can become a destructive obsession. But the same can be said for almost any activity — video gaming, social media browsing, physical exercise, and on and on.

Black to Move and Mate in 11. In this game, I played the black pieces. My opponent played the London System opening. He attacked on the king side, while I attacked on the queen side. I won with 27… Rxb2! threatening Rc2+. If 28. Kxb2 Rb8+ followed by Qa3 forces checkmate.

Black to Move and Mate in 9. I played the black side of a Sicilian Defense. My opponent played the Snyder Variation (2. b3). My opponent castled queen side, but my queen side attack was quicker than his king side attack. I won with 23… Nxe2+ unleashing the bishop on f6. After 24. Rdxe2 Qxb2+ 25. Kd2 Rd8+ the white king was flushed out to the center of the board and was mated a few moves later.

White to Move and Win the Black Knight. I played the white pieces and opened with 1. e4. My opponent played the rock-solid Caro-Kann Defense. I opted for the Exchange Variation. I won with 35. Ne4 attacking the black queen and eyeing the f6 hole. After 35… Qb5 36. Rxd5 Rxd5 37. Nf6+ Kf8 38. Nxd5 I had won a piece. Knights are tricky in the endgame.

White to Move and Win the Exchange. I played another white side of a Caro-Kann Defense, Exchange Variation. Black was probing weaknesses in my queen side with his knight, but after 19. b4 Nc4 20. Nc6 Qc2 21. Nxb1 I had won a rook for a knight. I eventually stabilized the queen side and broke through to the black king with f4 and f5 but it was a hard fight.