Yes Jetset, hockey's on the blog but there is more

its hockey culture! and if you are canadian, its always around you.
and i do love how the girls partied it up after their win, there is a dose of feminism in there somewhere.

i've been in a mental vacuum for 2 weeks, consumed with the olympics and cheering for our guys and gals. i must admit i needed many kleenexes over the past week and my pile of correcting has grown monumental.  it was nice to celebrate others' great accomplishments too, take a look at Marit Bjorgen, she's amazing! and that ice skate by Yu Na Kim? surreal. the americans were all round fab and they seemed to have great spirit. kind of fun.

as i'm a romantic, i absolutely loved the Mahler skate for gold by our Virtue and Moir. so pretty, so delicate. this is where we were at our best.  while lots tried to be flashy and dramatic in ice dance, the talent was made so obvious in these two by the understated choreography. its too bad Vanoc didn't see that thats what canadians do best; the opening and closing ceremonies shows were so-so, the pop songs and big flashy rock didn't get people going, it seemed contrived. it was kd lang singing "hallelulah" and neal young crooning "long may you run"that was best. beauty in simplicity. i suspect russia will be the opposite, everything over the top, it will be interesting for that, and it in their nature.

everyone is talking about how the games unified canada, and it will be interesting to see where we go from here. we've lost our mojo on the world stage in recent years. at one time, we really pushed to be the facilitators for peace, equality, fairness, diplomacy, the environment, etc  i guess this was most apparent in the Trudeau 70's. i'm hoping that now that we are a little more comfortable in our tuques, a little more sure of ourselves, we will once again have the potential to bring people together in other ways other than sport. our non-commitment to the environment, the tar sands of Alberta included, have been very sore spots for me.  not standing up and screaming 'we need to do more' during the summit in Copenhagen was embarrassing. we were acting like the US's little puppy, saying we'll do it only if they do it. 

would i be crazy to say that the world sees Canada and hopes for the best? everyone expected the censorship, the lipsynking girls scandal in China. and in such a big city as London, how can they not have transport issues and protests? but here, they were traveling to the land of polite, peace loving people. i think everyone one wanted the perfect party and then, when the beginning of the games didn't start off great, everyone panicked. us included.

the brits are now saying that we are thin-skinned, that we didn't deal well with their criticism. what is  admirable is the transparency of our process. we may to do wrong but everyone does. isn't it better for it to come out and to deal with it, than to brush them off or scare them away? we were transparent in what we did, what we wanted. i think there is dignity in that. we don't have the efficiency of the germans, the money of the US, the thinking power of the brits. we have what? i'm not entirely sure but i'm hoping something was found that was lost. and not just our patriotism, which has been great, but maybe a sense of obligation to the world?

every canadian athlete i saw was a gracious winner and a gracious loser. we were disappointed midway through but we didn't blame others when it was apparent we wouldn't "own the podium".  we would be sad but we'd get over it and do better next time.

luckily we have amazing athletes and don't have to be sad! i hope the rest of us, the non-althetes do learn from their determinism and faith.