An Olympic effort

How many of you are watching some of the Olympics in Tokyo?

NBC has the rights to the games but you can find it on sports channels too. The Today Show is covering it each morning with the whole Today crew, to the point of eliminating other true news stories that are happening in our country and around the world. I usually watch The Today Show to get my news when I start my day, but during this time I find I switch channels, and I only have a little interest in the whole Olympics event.

Am I the only one?

Why am I not interested? Why do I prefer to tune out and watch other programming?

Is it an age thing? Or, heaven help me, am I unpatriotic? Some will say so.

Here’s my big take-away from the Olympic effort by all the athletes over there:

Most of them have trained since childhood for this moment. Most of them are in a sport that does not have a professional avenue to continue a career. Most of the sports I watch I find to be such a ‘one and done’ try… and winner takes all, and one slip up and you are out. You lose. The amount of pressure put on athletes to go to the other side of the world, during a pandemic, to achieve greatness in one moment, to not let down teammates and their country… it’s crushing – and it just seems sad. Even though they smile and talk to the Today Show hosts, how can they not feel disappointed if they don’t medal? And for the most part, it IS the ones that medal that get the TV interview. So – Is it just me? Do I want to watch Simone mess up? Do I want to see people lose by a tenth of a point? A tenth of a second? A slight trip of the foot? Or a bad turn at the pool wall? Is skateboarding tricks really worthy of being ‘Olympic?” Is it crazy that some are fined for wanting to put more clothes on??

Do I want to see our country go up against others countries and compete? Don’t we do enough of that anyway?

I know, I seem cynical about the Olympics. I should be thinking about the athletes achieving dreams, and enjoying new experiences, and making new friends. Yes, yes. That’s very nice. I have nothing against all of that.

But, I just feel we live in a time now where we are in dire need of promoting unity, and inclusion, and acceptance. I think we need to be Uber-aware of world issues, and the pandemic around the globe is huge. Did you know that around 100 US athletes did not get vaccinated yet they flew half way around the world to compete? They put their ‘personal performance” first ahead of the need to protect the community of people that they are in. Yes, I know the athletes get tested daily – and precautions have been set up – to keep them all as safe as possible without requiring vaccinations. But, why not even the playing field and require it? What really is MOST important?

It seems ironic that the athletes are allowed to travel from everywhere and NOT be vaccinated. Yet, we ordinary people can not. Their own families can’t travel to watch them in person. And, hey, I’m okay that they and we can not freely travel. I get the need for caution until we get the pandemic is behind us.

We live in a time where news has a ‘hot’ period, and then once time goes by we, the public, don’t want to hear about it anymore. We are there with CoVid. That was SO last year! We don’t want to hear about the new strain, and about the unvaccinated getting sick (and it’s there fault anyway, right?), and we want to move on…

To find something new to get involved in. To the next big news story, and to something that will get our minds off of the old problems.

And right now that is the Olympics.

One day years from now someone will be able to say “I skateboarded in the Tokyo Olympics during a pandemic.” Okay. Whatever.

PS: I love sports. I am an avid college and pro football fan. I love the NCAA basketball “March Madness” event. I appreciate the God-given talents, and the hard work that is put in, that makes a person an athlete. I know some who don’t care about sports at all – any of them. That’s not me.