Jennifer Brown

A week ago, I began instructing The Hub to stay off of AOL.

Hub: Why?

Me: Because you'll get Olympics spoilers, and you can never keep them to yourself!

Hub: I won't tell. I promise.

Me: *grumblemumblegrowl* BETTER NOT!!! I will seek revenge if you even try!

Since then, twice he's almost "accidentally" slipped a spoiler on me. Once, while sitting on the recliner browsing his laptop while I was watching the Olympics ten feet away. The gall of some people!

He should know better. He knows how I am about my Olympics. Mess with my excitement and things will get ugly and fast.

I just can't help it. I love them. I love love lovelovelovelove them *pets pretty rings on TV*. Summer or Winter. Curling or diving. Skating! Skiing! Snowboarding! Love them all!

I grew up watching the Olympics (Mom is a big fan, too, but probably not as big a fan as I am). I would watch the ice skating, then slip a blanket over my head and twirl around the room, pretending to be the amazing Dorothy Hamill (and, yes, of course I had the hair cut). I can remember most of the Big Moments all the way back to probably Mary Lou Retton. Maybe even farther back than that. I swear, I have some of the footage memorized at this point.

See, there's this thing about the Olympics that we just don't spend enough time on anymore: BELIEF. Not just belief in a dream, but belief in oneself to achieve any dream in the world.

So many of us spend so much time dwelling on truly negative stuff. Arguing with strangers online. Arguing with husbands and wives and in-laws. Worrying about the possibility of bad things to come. So rarely do we spend the quality time with our dreams that we do with our frustrations.

In so many ways, Olympic athletes are just regular people. They have financial hardship and medical emergencies and tragedies and trauma. But they don't let those things take away their belief that they can do something great. That they can have that moment, standing on the podium with the whole world cheering, thinking, "Yes. I did this. I did THIS!"

Last night, while watching Snowboard Cross, Speed Demon turned to me and said, "I think I might want to be in the Olympics someday."

And that's the main reason I love The Olympics so much.

Because

BELIEF

is contagious.

(NOTE: Because I am so picky about my Olympics, I am taking a Twitter hiatus for the duration of the games. GO TEAM USA!!!)