The Games

The poet, Langston Hughes, is often quoted, “What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or does it explode?”

With the start of the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia we once again marvel at a gathering of disciplined dreamers, beautiful and athletic and with a degree of commitment and achievement that leaves me gobsmacked. (I always wanted to use that word in a post)

The Olympics are one of the very best sporting events in part because of the many nations participating and the stories of the athletes in their efforts to go “faster, higher and stronger.” Here’s a fun fact, the Olympic motto --- “faster, higher, stronger” is accredited to a Dominican Priest, Henri Didon, who used the words when he addressed an opening ceremony at a school sporting event. Yowzers, that must have been some school! The only words I remember spoken before my school sporting events were, “Have fun.”

What I will most look forward to in these Games are the stories of the athletes most of whom we have never heard of, coming from small towns and villages of which we also are not familiar.

Although, I have zero clue what they look for or how they score anything in snowboarding, Sage Kostenberg claimed the first gold medal of the games for his victory in the Snowboard Slopestyle and he was a picture of hip and cool as he chewed gum on his last run sporting what looked to be khakis.

Of course, there will be the stories that break our sporting hearts -- the American athlete coming into the Opening Ceremonies on crutches after injuring her knee in a training run already has started the crack. I will look for the tales of the athletes whom have no chance of “making the podium,” yet are there to compete, to have their Olympic experience and simply to be part of the moment.

Enjoy the Games. Celebrate the stories.

There is something about the Games that lends itself to envisioning one’s own athletic glory. Tell me, you have never imagined yourself an Olympic luge contestant while sledding down the hill or, Sarah Hughes in a gold-medal skate while gliding across the local pond?

In this “the winter of our discontent,” I am imagining that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has named snow shoveling an Olympic sport. In the competition, the judges are looking for style, crisp lines and clean surfaces. I’m going for the gold! Then again, I would gladly put away my shovel for the big melt and train for the Summer Olympic sport of mowing the lawn.

sj;