A Non-Olympian "Thanks, Mom"

With a heavy heart I'm posting from Sochi with news my wonderful mother Betty entered hospice care in Oklahoma on Monday night. The news is surprising given her condition just two weeks ago was good. Writing in a fog.

 

Too many non-Games memories to share, but I will always love that Mom bought me the influential-to-seven-year-olds Lake Placid 1980 Olympic color book when I was in first grade, and she took my sister and I to the Los Angeles 1984 Olympic Torch Relay in Edmond, Okla., the fifth-grade summer event that launched my Olympic journeys.

 

In 1989 we volunteered together at U.S. Olympic Festival '89, and the following summer she drove me to the 6 a.m. flight to Minneapolis for my first paid Olympic gig at U.S. Olympic Festival '90 (setting the course for my college days in the Land of 10,000 Lakes). Neither of us knew that flight would be the first of hundreds for this traveler (hard to know who had more nervous excitement).

 

It was Mom who first told me the 1990 news Atlanta won the 1996 Olympics, setting another course for nine Olympiads of fun. On Mother's Day 1996 she held the "runner flag" to start my leg of the Atlanta Olympic Torch Relay. 

 

Before and since her diagnosis of Alzheimer's in 2008, she always supported my five-ringed dreams and every dream. In her determined fight to slow down her condition, we shared dozens of walks and talks -- the above photo from one hike at Lake Arcadia near Edmond -- and it was so fun to show her around D.C., Atlanta and Savannah in recent years. As she did through years of working hard as a self-employed parent (her seamstress business boomed during the 1980s and 1990s in support of my sister's and my dreams), she continued to smile and laugh through each step of her declining condition.

 

I love you, Mom. Thank you, Mom. I will be home to Oklahoma on Friday, the soonest airlines could arrange passage from Sochi. Prayers appreciated for Mom, my dad and sister at her side, and for many family members, friends and caregivers helping mom. Fingers crossed the journey home will get me there safely and in a timely manner.

 

The blog will resume in due time. Thank you for reading and for support.

 

Photos by Nicholas Wolaver

Looking Forward To Seeing Betty

It's Day 16, and the Games are winding down. The last couple of days included a visit to the Olympic Village, interaction with Olympic gold medalists from the track, football pitch and swimming pool, and more pin trading than should be legal for any one person.

This morning included time for reflection on the London Olympic experience. I took at taxi to Parliament Square (where this Games officially began for me personally) for a morning meeting at the London Media Centre, then I spent an hour at church learning about the Unitarian Universalist congregation of London founded in the 1780s.

Oh, and picked up a Closing Ceremony ticket.

I look forward to the return to Olympic Stadium and seeing the cauldron in its end-of-field location.

The London Olympic cauldron designers and ceremony team nicknamed the mega-torch "Betty" as a codeword to keep its design, construction and installation a secret, so it will be fun to revisit "Betty" before the flame is extinguished.

The changeover ceremony for Rio 2016 is also highly anticipated -- I hope there are some fun surprises. My money is on a Pele cameo. I hope also to get another shot at photographing Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge (Kate Middleton) like at synchronized swimming.

As my fingers type this post, for its money from Team Spain in the Olympic basketball. Go USA!

There are tons of photos and heaps of videos to upload and share, which should be good fodder for more post-Games updates to this Olympic blog. I appreciate everyone reading and sending nice notes of support via Facebook during the last 16 days, and look forward to sharing more of the London Olympic story, a look at Sochi 2014 and Rio 2016 and more photos very soon.

Photo via The Guardian and Getty