I Love the Olympics

If you're an Olympics hater, stop reading now. Just a warning, because I'm about to get all sentimental and stuff. OK, for those of you still reading, I love the Olympics. I love everything about them, and every time another opening ceremony comes around, I find myself reliving the Salt Lake games because, let's face it, they were pretty awesome. How often do the Olympics come to your hometown? Yeah, it's once in a lifetime, and I lived it up. I used my poor man's scanner (meaning I took pictures of my pictures) so I could share some of my favorite memories. Here's the view from the nosebleed seats during the women's figure skating long program.

Yes, I was there, and that was huge. Being in the arena for an Olympic figure skating event had been on my bucket list long before I knew what a bucket list was—and I was there for the event. Amazing. I also got to go to the men's short program, where I made Evgeni Plushenko fall. See, I was whispering "Fall, fall," every time he went up for a jump, and then it happened. He fell. I felt a bit guilty, but only a bit.

Here's me outside Canada House.

I also saw the Barenaked Ladies at the Medals Plaza, so I figure I was just celebrating the Vancouver Olympics eight years early.

And this is me by the cauldron. How did I get so close, you ask? Well, it's because I had the greatest job I've ever had and maybe ever will have, and it was a volunteer thing. I worked backstage at opening and closing ceremonies, which meant being at the stadium sometimes for 18 hours straight, in freezing temperatures, doing the same things over and over and over. (I have great appreciation for how great those flags look during the parade of nations, because I know how many times we steamed the ones in Salt Lake to get out every single wrinkle.) It also meant I got some pretty great perks, like getting to be a stand-in U.S. athlete for the dress rehearsal's parade of nations; hanging out with Dorothy Hamill before the closing ceremony; handing the Olympic flag off to Steven Spielberg, Desmond Tutu, Jean-Claude Killy, John Glenn, and a few other outstanding folks; watching the closing ceremony fireworks from the top of the stadium; and being part of the group that helped hand over the flag to the mayor of Turino. Sure, my part in that was all behind the scenes, but I did get to pretend to be the mayor during dress rehearsals, and then escort the real mayor backstage during the real thing.

But the best part of the gig, by far, was watching the athletes. Since we were handing out the flags, we got to see them just before they walked out into the stadium for the parade of nations. As Bob Costas likes to remind us, the parade of nations is the Olympic moment for most of the athletes. As much as I dislike Bob and his snarky comments, this is one thing he gets right. They know they have no chance of winning a medal; they're there for the Olympic experience, and they're so excited to finally be there that most of them just can't contain their joy. I got lots of high fives and lots of "this is so cool" grins, but my favorite was a giant bear hug I got from a Croatian skier. He was so giddy he was hugging everybody. How can you not love something that brings out that sort of reaction?

And that's why I'll be losing sleep for the next two weeks. Not for the medal count or the media darlings or the Visa commercials (although I actually like the Visa commercials), but to watch people as they see their hard work pay off and their dreams come true. There's nothing else like it.