As the Olympic Games draw to a close, I have been struck how, for at least a little while, we have been one nation.
I watched the opening ceremonies and you see the pure joy and excitement on these athletes' faces. For some, that Parade of Nations IS their Olympic experience. They will compete, but the expectations for some are not so great.
After the first round of team ice skating and the now famous images of Ashley Wagner's face and her commentary on the judges' scores for her performance, I took to Facebook and was immediately conscious of the terms "our girl" and "the American" when my friends were voicing their thoughts on the judging. "How could the Chinese girl score better when she fell and our girl didn't?"
Aside from the issues of judging certain events, and, let's face it, scoring is easier when there is a time clock involved - no one ever awards style points because your skies sparkled or matched your racing suit better - there were very valid injured feelings towards "our girl". I doubt many had heard of her before that night but now everyone was up in arms and ready to defend her!
We are a nation of labels - Republican, Democrat, white, black, Jewish, Protestant, Catholic, Gay, Straight, short, tall, skinny, overweight. But during the Olympics the only labels you see are skater, skier, luger, bobsledder. They are all Americans. The only distinguishing feature is their sport.
And we cheer for the Americans. How many times have you turned on the television to see an event in progress and your only question is "which one is the American? Where's our guy?". We don't understand curling. But we don't have to to be able to support our home team. I can't tell a triple Lutz from a quadruple Salchow but I can cheer for the young Gracie Gold. Because she is an American. We don't discriminate because of someone's color, or whether or not they graduated college, or if they voted for President Obama or not. None of that is relevant to the race being run. Did he ski the fastest? Did she fall during her routine? Those are the questions that matter.
For just a little while we are not a nation of Denver Broncos vs. Seattle Seahawks, Boston Red Sox vs. New York Yankees, or SEC football vs. the rest of the collegiate conferences. We are the USA against the World - literally.
And we love it.
I just wish we could carry it over after the cauldron flame is extinguished tonight.
Like I've said before, we come together as a nation during times of tragedy and triumph. It's all the times in between where we drop the ball.
For two weeks we have been One Nation. Under God. Indivisible.
Monday morning we'll start hearing again how the Left did this or the Right didn't do this. News stories will be told that identify the people as a White Man or a Black Woman when the color of the person's skin is truly and completely irrelevant to the story (not like a missing person or an escaped convict).
People will be labeled according to any manner of means.
I'm not a fan of labels.
I am just me.
I am an American.
I think we would all be better served if we could learn to put those monikers aside and remember that People are People. We come in all shapes, sizes, ethnic backgrounds, religious ideologies and a myriad other preferences. But if we can look beyond and really, truly, see the person behind the label, I think we could see that we all have something that is worth cheering.
And we shouldn't wait two more years until the Summer Games to do so.
