Celebration....
I can only imagine his feelings at finally achieving this goal. Those countless long laps, back and forth across a pool, alone at 5 a.m. in cold water. It's like waiting your whole life for your magical wedding day, dating frog after frog after frog. Or waiting those long nine months to look at the face of your child for the first time. Walking across the stage for that diploma you scrimped and scraped and worked your ass off for.
That time that seemed so endless, leading up to the day that seemed it would never come, gone by in a blink. It seems like a hundred years ago, and yet only yesterday, that you were single, childless, or walking into that first classroom. Stepping into that pool for the first time. Another person entirely, and yet still fundamentally you.
The moment is now; today is the day. You've envisioned it thousands of times in your mind, and it will be everything (yet completely different from all that) you were sure it would be. So much more amazing, so much more perfect and right.
We can all have moments like this in our life, if we reach for them. The elation I see in the photo above is how I felt when my daughter was put into my arms for the first time, and again three years later, when my son arrived.
How moving it is now, to be able to stand by and watch Michael as he has his moment, surrounded by so many lenses, so many spectators. How generous of him to share this with all of us. This is exactly why I love the Olympics so much. We can all tap into the emotions we feel as we watch the athletes experience those personal triumphs, and use them to inspire us in our own lives.
Congratulations, Michael.
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