Olympics

It's that the Olympics remind us that we can aspire to something, and that sometimes, we can succeed, gloriously, as an individual, or as a group, a team, a nation. It's drama, and triumph and heartbreak. It's a timeout for peace, a putting on the ritz, a best foot forward, an idealized world. It's good for us to spend some time being post-jaded and wide-eyed, for our hearts to beat faster in empathy, or sympathy, or even envy.

The real world is so gritty. For most people life is generally sheer drudgery punctuated with tragedy with only intermittent moments of joy. I think we live for those fleeting hours of occasional synchronicity when all is right with our piece of the world, or when we accomplish something, or create something. And that is part of what the Olympics is about. It shows us we can reach for something better and have a hope of reaching it.

The other thing the Olympics does is remind us that we are not so different, nation to nation, as we think we are. A man from Kenya runs alongside a man from Morocco, and they share a bottle of water as they vie for the gold medal in the final event, the men's marathon. Just a couple of guys, well sort of. Except that they can both run for twenty six miles faster than I can really run across the yard. And later, on the podium, the Moroccan looked like a kind fellow,a bit bewildered, overwhelmed by the crowd, courteous to the presenter. Just a nice young man. Maybe a little foreign, but human, some kind of kin.

Chinese girls fell off the beam just like American ones did, and our hearts stopped for each of them. Frenchmen and Jamaicans and Brits showed glimpses of 'inappropriate' bravado -- young warriors strutting their stuff, reveling. Ubiquitous volunteers had learned a smattering of English and stood smiling and justifiably proud and ready to help.

I love the Olympics. From the events themselves, to the pageantry and showmanship and technology and the spectacle of it all. Including the tv commercials. Thanks all you who put it on every four years. It makes me really happy.