Best of Beth Ashley: Games that unite, not divide, us

Editor’s note: The IJ is reprinting some of the late Beth Ashley’s columns. This is from 2008. If I sound a bit groggy, let me explain. I have been up late, night after night, watching the Olympic Games. I realize some of you are indifferent, but the Olympics, to me, are a four-year high point. […]

Editor’s note: The IJ is reprinting some of the late Beth Ashley’s columns. This is from 2008.

If I sound a bit groggy, let me explain.

I have been up late, night after night, watching the Olympic Games.

I realize some of you are indifferent, but the Olympics, to me, are a four-year high point. It’s not just about athletics, but about the human spirit and the unifying force of excellence, wherever it is found.

When an athlete bobbles a chance for Olympic glory, I feel equally sad whether he or she is from the United States or the Lesser Antilles.

On the other hand, if someone lands a spectacular win, I am wowed whether or not the athlete is one of ours.

Not to say it isn’t great fun when a hometown person takes the gold. I was as thrilled as the rest of you by the performances of Michael Phelps. One of the pluses, of course, was that Phelps seemed so nice. A hero, without being media-bland handsome.

Most events are mesmerizing: swimming, gymnastics, track and field. But beach volleyball? Spare me. Synchronized diving? Pfft — until the Chinese showed how it was done.

I’m pretty addicted to track and field, dating from the days of Kip Keino, Lasse Virén, Frank Shorter, Wilma Rudolph and Valeriy Borzov. But I’ll stay up late for any of it (thanks for the torment, NBC).

The first sprints were a relief: athletes of color at last!

The most stirring part of an Olympics, to me, is the opening parades, when the athletes and the flags of participants roll out one by one, each entrant so proud, so gorgeously young, so fit.

The flag — and the importance — of each nation, be it Malawi or Mongolia, gets equal time.

We are reminded that human dreams and aspirations have equal value in all parts of the Earth. Kirsty Coventry from Zimbabwe: you go, girl!

The current Olympics — like those for most of a century — have an overlay of global politics. We all remember 1936, when track star Jesse Owens, an African American, stuck it to the Nazis and their theories of Aryan superiority. Ever since, it seems, the competition has been for the highest medal count among nations: did we not, throughout the Cold War, try to smother the Russians? (Did my 12-year-old son not weep in 1972, when the Russians — unfairly — beat us in basketball?) Are we not now, not very subliminally, locked in a race with the Chinese, whose rising economic superiority threatens our self-image as kings of the world?

A book I just read about North and South Korea points out the geopolitical ramifications of the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, which tipped the diplomatic balance throughout Asia. When your country hosts the Olympics, you become a big player on the international stage.

So yes, the games are political, but they are also an opportunity to look beyond all that.

They are a time to focus on what unites us, rather than what pits us against each other.

When you see the athletes romping around the field in the closing ceremonies, when you see winners and losers embracing each other, when you sense that each athlete is a world unto himself, with his own aspirations and history, it is hard to divide them by nations.

The camaraderie is palpable, joyous.

We can believe in the possibility of crossover, of continued good will.

When the 2008 games are over, we’ll settle back into business as usual — it was ever thus.

But while the good feelings last, I just want to watch and watch and watch.