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March 01 2010

OLYMPIC FATIGUE

The Olympics are finally over and for me it’s not a moment too soon. I’m exhausted. One more week and who knows where I might have ended up? I never knew that watching the games could be such an overwhelming responsibility. By turn I had to will the rain to stop falling, the fog to lift and the people in charge of the Richmond Speed Skating Oval to bring in a new Zamboni. I corrected officials, overturned judges and busily corrected any unfortunate errors made by the announcers.

Coaching all the Canadian athletes simultaneously took up a great deal of my time. From my perch on the couch I encouraged the skiers to lean into the turns and urged the speed skaters to push harder to the sides and save themselves for that all important final stretch to the finish line. I didn’t let the fact that I hadn’t been on a pair of skis for 30 years and had never so much as laid eyes on a pair of speed skates discourage me in the least. After watching the event for five minutes I suddenly knew everything necessary to win. You could say it was something of a miracle. In fact that’s exactly what Darcy called it. His exact words were “It’s a miracle how you know so much about all these different sports when all you ever like to do is go for a walk.”

What can I say? Well, judging by my hoarse voice, apparently quite a lot. If all I was doing was reasoning with the officials, advising the commentators, choosing players for hockey shoot outs, giving speed enhancing advice and letting athletes know who was closing in on them and what they should do about it, I might not be so worn out. But once the events were done, much to my surprise, my job still wasn’t over. I was also in charge of crowd control, medal presentations and what colour of necktie was a better match for Brian William’s suit jacket. Availability of washrooms, souvenirs and food were also of grave concern, though I was severely limited in what I could do about it given what little information was made available to me. In the end I had to reluctantly concede to the people in charge. It was a most unsettling state of affairs. Now that it’s over I may have to spend another two weeks on the couch just to recover.

I’m not sure if it’s an age thing, but this is the first Olympics where I wasn’t motivated to get out there and take up a sport myself. There’s nothing like seeing one competitor after another cartwheel down a mountain to make my stress free walks down a quiet country road look pretty good by comparison. I can’t help but wonder what kind of pain these athletes are going to be in when they get into their forties and beyond. So many have already had surgeries on their knees or suffered multiple fractures. And then there’s the pressure to win a medal to satisfy all of us rabid couch spuds who have shelled out the $117 million for the Own the Podium program and aren’t very impressed with other countries rent cheques. Though why we wanted to own the podium instead of the medals, one can only guess.

It’s a fine line we ask our athletes to walk. If they lose we don’t want them to act like they don’t care. Nothing angers a tax payer more than seeing an athlete shrug and say, “Oh well, I’m just happy to be here.” However, we don’t want to hear any excuses either, even if they are simply being honest enough to speak their truths. It seems there is only one answer that satisfies: “I tried my best but it wasn’t enough. I’m sorry Canada.” A few tears are acceptable, but outright wailing is not. Turns out we’re a pretty rigid and demanding audience. No, there is nothing easy about being an athlete.

But I’m talking like someone who is feeling old and a bit jaded and you have to remember I am also exhausted, which so often leads to melancholy. I am leaving out the wild joy of flying first across that finish line, scoring the winning goal or seeing your name vault to top of the list along with your flag. And even if you didn’t win you still possessed incredible courage to dream and fly along beside the best in the world. Heartfelt congratulations to all who dared to play the game. Maybe I’m a little inspired after all. I just might do something radical, like add an extra kilometre to my walk.