Wow!

As much as I would love to have seen Michelle Kwan win the gold for women's free skate, Sarah Hughes did an outstanding job and definitely deserved the gold. I thought Kwan's programme was too conservative, she fell, and both she and Irina Slutskaya had problems. Sarah Hughes' programme was quite difficult (and history-making, landing two triple combinations in one programme), clean, and well, she just seemed to embody the spirit of ice skating, a spirit sadly lacking in this controversial Olympics. Sasha Cohen had excellent choreography, but she had trouble with her jumps and fell. The commentators kept saying that Kwan had Slutskaya beat in presentation, but I beg to differ. Of course, I tend to prefer the more modern style than serenity on ice.

It was fun to watch a sixteen year-old so thrilled, so taken aback by what she'd done. Maybe that's the problem with ice skating. As people age in the sport, it makes you jaded, with a loss of some of the spontaneus exhuberance that can make it so fun to watch. She seemed happy to just have the chance to skate in the Olympics, nevermind placing, and her energy carried over into her performance. And all the skaters I saw tonight, even those who fell, even those who made mistakes, fought to keep their programmes going and to finish strongly to counteract their problems. That, I think, is Olympic spirit.

I know people who are boycotting the Olympics, because of the shady dealing, etc. While I'm appalled by the scandals that have rocked this Olympic Games, I must say that I see no reason not to support the athletes, who didn't have to do with those scandals. I'll just find it reassuring if we can get through a few more days without bombs, terrorism, or any other major mishaps. Lest we forget, we still haven't managed to deal with the wounds left from the last American Olympics. Indeed, I recently read of the woman killed during the bombing, Alice Hawthorne, husband's disappointment that in the midst of rememberances for those killed during the Munich games in the early '70s and those killed by terror in the 9/11 attacks, that his wife had been forgotten, mainly because it was "only one life" lost to the shrapnel that day. (Another person, a Turkish cameraman, also died, but his was from a heart attack brought on as he rushed to cover the story). As the widower put it, that one life meant everything to him.

So, when I look at the Olympic flame burning in its tower, I think of Sarah Hughes, with her dream of gold, and Alice Hawthorne, who died supporting that same dream.

And when it comes down to it, the thing I find special about the Olympics, in all the years I've watched--through embargoes, scandals, and brilliant moments, is that so many people from so many nations come together in peaceful competion (okay, I'm an optimist), which inspires me and it makes even a pudgy couch-potato like myself want to get up and move.