Well, the games are over. I had a good time watching from my front-row living room seats every night for 17 nights. I laughed, I cried, I cringed and I cheered. I jumped up and down like a crazy person. I screamed. I yelled. Did I mention I cried? I had more mood swings in those 17 days than I did when I was pregnant and I thought my husband ate all the chips.
Names like Joannie, Alexandre, Heil, Jacey Jay, Hamelin, Virtue and Moir are now etched in our collective consciousnesses. Sid became everybody’s kid, and that last gold will shine on in our hearts and our history books. I’m quite sure I’ll be relaying the event to my children – who didn’t realize they were witnessing history and not just their mother freaking out 7 minutes into overtime in the gold medal game – in decades to come.
We waved our red and white mittens at each other, a hundred thousand little flags greeting the world and welcoming them to a country we were for once, outspokenly, proud to say was ours. For the first time, maybe in forever, I felt like Vancouverites didn’t hate me because I was from Toronto, and that it might not be hazardous to sit in the first row in front of Ashley McIsaac. We experienced a patriotism that the blurred the lines between provinces and in the memory of urine-soaked indignities. It was magical.
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