The Olympic Flame

I just watched the Olympic flame pass by only a few blocks from where I live. To put it bluntly, I was moved. Say what you will about the negative aspects of the Games (and do say them), call me delusional, call me naïve, call me maudlin, call me sentimental, call me corny, call me whatever the heck you want – but I could feel my own Olympic fire smouldering, could feel it find new fuel as I watched the torch’s orange flame dancing and vanishing upwards into a cloudless sky. Ignoring (for a moment) everything that surrounded the torch, from the giant Coke vehicles to the armed police escort, I focused only on that flame, felt only what it has represented to me – an ever-moving energy, a spirit within that strains against limitations, pushes out with a creative force.

I’ve been to the Olympic Museum and the IOC headquarters in Lausanne. I’ve stood beside a statue of Paavo Nurmi and looked out across the shining waters of Lake Geneva to the French Alps beyond. I’ve dreamed the Olympic dream as the sun set behind the French hills – not for love of fame or power or control, but for love of human ideals, which seemed so fragile against the darkening mountains. We project meaning into the world, and sometimes it seems to diffuse like a spotlight splaying into the night sky. But our meaning has the power to move us, and the meaning of the Olympics – faster, higher, stronger – has the power to move us beyond what we thought was possible. Yes, it makes some cheat and makes others roll their eyes in disdain, but against all that, I hold fast to a belief that its ideals have done some good and that they still hold valuable potential.

I’m glad the torch passed by on a Wednesday, a day when I meet Cliff and the others at the track for some hard speed work. I can carry this over-wrought enthusiasm onto the track and let it push me in my quest to become faster and stronger. I’ll never run in the Olympics, but I’ve got my own Olympic goals and dreams that invest my training with meaning. And that faith that what I do in training has some kind of meaning spills over into all aspects of my life. Against an ever-looming empty darkness, I try to keep my own Olympic flame lit. It would be easy to lay down in the darkness and sleep this life away, but I think it’s way more fun to chase the flame up the mountainside.

Here’s to sport – one of the best things we do as a species.