why i love the olympics

certainly not because i am an athlete - although in my dreams i do wish that i could actually look good in any of the outfits these people wear...luge, honestly. maybe i could wear the goalie outfit for hockey...figure skating, have you ever noticed that the men are fully clothed but the women are flying around on ice in bikinis? anyway, that is a topic for another day. and here i am saying that i would love to be an athlete, but i am not.

so why do i love the olympics? i will tell you. last night we were at hudson's bay company in downtown vancouver when canada won the first gold medal on canadian soil. we heard it before we saw it. the entire store, yes, the entire department store went crazy- complete strangers hugging and saying "yeah canada!". when we stopped to see the replay on a tv in the middle of the men's section, a whole group of people stopped to watch with us. for 30 seconds we all stopped and celebrated the achievement of a mogul skier that no one expected to win.

when we got home we watched the tv footage of his interviews, etc... so then we find out that this guy has an older brother that has cerebral palsy. they show these two brothers together, and i am sitting there, not just crying, but veritably sobbing with my husband. the gold medal winner is simply stating that he has no room to complain since he can walk. everytime he feels like skipping out of practice he remembers his brother that was not supposed to walk after the age of 10, and he is well past that now and still going strong,  then they show the footage of the older brother standing and cheering for his brother as he comes down the hill. yup...still sobbing.

it is beauty, heroism and simple home-spun humility that i just don't see in the multi-million dollar athletes that play professional sports.

and that is why i love the olympics.