Tomorrow is a day that I look forward to for four years—the start of the Winter Olympics and the Opening Ceremonies! I really love the Olympics—both Summer and Winter—but the Winter have a special attraction as I have been able to go to them twice. My family went in 1988 to Calgary in our motorhome which was quite the trip across the frozen Manitoba and Saskatchewan prairies. I was 13 and my brother was 10. In 2002, my husband, mom, her friend, and I went to Salt Lake City. Both were amazing trips! I am going to try each day during the next two weeks to tell a little about those trips and those Olympic Games on my social media. There are too many stories and too much info to tell in one, or even a couple, of blog posts.
Every four years during the Winter Olympics, I make it a priority to watch the Opening and Closing Ceremonies and as much of the coverage of the events as possible. I plan out meals based on the foods we ate when we were at the Games. I used to get out a globe and make my kids find the different countries as they entered the stadium during the Opening Ceremonies. They hated this, as I have recently discovered, but I saw it as an opportunity to help them learn where different countries are in the world and tried to talk about the history those countries had with the Olympics. Even if they thought it was annoying at the time, it is something they will always remember—crazy Mom making us find the countries on a globe.
As the kids have gotten older, it has gotten harder to get us to all sit down together to watch. Fortunately, they know how important this is to me and understand that asking me to take you somewhere during a major event—like hockey finals, big curling matches, or pretty much anything the USA is involved in—will be met with an “Are you kidding me??” look to which they immediately ask their Dad or find a friend to take them. My 15-year-old has Winter Formal this weekend (don’t even get me started on that…probably a blog post to come on that business), and wants to get her nails done for it. She found out this week that she has to work on Saturday morning so we need to do this Friday. Of course, this is the one Friday in the entire month that I have to work until 4:30. She strategically proposed the idea of being able to get them done as soon as I get home from work and being able to get back home in time to watch the Opening Ceremonies and have our Olympic meal. It’s a good thing I love her because she is pushing the limits here just to have pretty nails with a couple little red hearts on them when there are torches to pass and cauldrons to be lit and interpretive dances and a flag to be raised. I am already disappointed that the oiled-up cross-country skier from Tonga will not be there this year to carry his country’s flag as he seemed to feel that helping his country rebuild from a massive volcanic eruption and resulting tsunami is more important. That is just one more reason I love him, and I’m sure he is in need of my assistance in his efforts on that small tropical island. But I digress…
This Friday, February 4th, the Opening Ceremonies will be live broadcasted at 5:30am CT. An enhanced re-play will begin at 7:00pm CT. I will for sure be up watching what I can live tomorrow morning while I do a little strength workout and get ready for work. Tomorrow evening is the Big Event. When we were in Calgary, we stayed at a place called Symon’s Valley Ranch. It was an RV park and had a main lodge with a restaurant. We ate there several times, and one of my favorites was the Alberta Beef Dip and steak fries. That is what we will be having tomorrow night while I tell everyone to shut up as I cry watching the athletes come in nation by nation, their years of hard work, perseverance, sacrifice, grit, coming down to this.
“I declare open the Games of Beijing celebrating the 24th Winter Olympic Games.”
Peace.
Julia
