4 August
12:01:37 PM
Russian, Poles, Korean, Brazil, Fiji, South Africa and all the others.
2012, London Olympics. From what I can see and hear, awesome.
Sitting here on a cool Saturday, week one has come and gone and
national pride, here in Aotearoa, is high and strong. Athletics and adventure have been high on my list of life experiences and they continue today, albeit in ways not expected. But then I remember, “expect the unexpected” :) that is so true.
It’s not the winning, the records, the medal tally that sits high on my list of enjoyable Olympic moments, no, it’s the sheer beauty of the human experience. No matter how ugly or how beautiful the moment it is the expression of humanity that gets me. The outpouring of emotion. The human spirit is quite extra-ordinary and seeing a reaction from a communist, a socialist, a capitalist, none of that makes any difference, it is the human being. The spirit within that is released into and onto the world that I find up lifting.
To see a face working at containing or releasing. The hands. The body language. We are all capable of greatness. Even in the small hidden areas of our life. I am blown away by the people who leap to help muy emily as we try and maneuver my wheelchair through a door, between tables, into an elevator. So much I have taken for granted, so much I have feared, so much I have secretly desired :)
And so, to see the emotional cap lifted through victory or defeat is totally up lifting. Mind you, at times, it’s almost too much for me, my own emotions get harness by my inability to fully breath and so I can be left struggling as I observe. But all in all I am loving it. I would love to write deeply and poignantly but for here, for now, this is enough. Recognition of the spirit that is the very backbone of the Olympic dream. Some will make it, some won’t. :)
