in 1988, i sat in the kitchen of my family home eating spaghetti while my mom cleaned up. i can clearly remember that evening, there's a distinct image of it in my mind. what i find funny and disappointing is the night that i ate spaghetti my sister was down on bath road with my dad watching the torch relay. my dad had suggested we all go, but i wanted to eat my dinner so i stayed behind (and my mom had to stay with me). in hindsight i've kicked myself for being so in the moment that i was more interested in that pasta then a nationwide event. but i can't fault myself too much, i was 8 and didn't realize that the torch didn't come thru collins bay during every olympics. since hearing of the 2010 olympic torch relay i've been looking forward to going, partly to make up for missing it in '88.
as i mentioned earlier this year that i'd put my name into a company draw to be a torch bearer. i wasn't selected but three of my colleagues were. today was their run - in napanee. i asked the knickers for permission to go, she hummed and hawed (she doesn't like it when i'm unavailable to her), but eventually conceeded if i agreed to make up the time. so i went. i was there at 8:00 just like my colleagues suggested, and waited an hour in the cold with the finance department. it wasn't too bad, and there was a bathroom handy at the laundromat across the street. actually, when i came out of the laundromat i saw all sorts of decorated trucks and thought that i'd missed the big event, but it was just the truck dropping off jason at his starting point. phew! that would've defeated the purpose of going. anyways, it was really fun watching dan come up the street with the flame. he waved at everyone along the way - which is so typical of him. he's a really nice and friendly man, and it made me smile to see him in his element. he met jason right in front of our little crowd and they stood touching their torches together. everyone cheered and jason headed off for his leg of the relay. a lot of people ran along beside on the sidewalk. it was fun. i have to admit, i wasn't as blown away by the experience as the people around me, but it did warm my heart and i felt happy to have finally seen the torch relay.
one thing that really struck me while standing there in the cold waiting, was that everyone was trigger happy with their cameras. everyone had a camera and everyone wanted a photo with jason and the torch. what disappoints me about this is that i would've like everyone to just be together, happily expecting dan to arrive with the flame and us all focus together on the events taking place. there's something very bizarre about picture-taking. it's like life has suddenly turned into a photo-op and is no longer about living. we're so distracted by the lens that we don't fully live the moment. the best experiences are those that grasp us so intensely that we don't even think to grab a camera. it's those moments that we wish afterwards that we'd captured it in pixels, but at the time it never crossed our minds. in fact, i don't have any photos from my last two birthday parties for that exact reason, i was too busy being with people and enjoying their company.
you know, in some ways you're a lot like me.
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