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Games pay dividends via kids' dreams
By Marjorie Cortez
Deseret News staff writer
A professional acquaintance asked in an post-Olympic e-mail this week: "Did you survive halfpipe and moguls?"
The thought of me strapped to a snowboard or bouncing my already-suspect knees along the moguls course made me laugh out loud.
Truth is, I haven't skied in more than 10 years. I broke my leg at the top of Brighton — getting off the chairlift, no less. That was followed by surgery, which I further complicated by falling on my crutches and breaking my wrist. I have surmised that this was the snow gods' way of telling me that I should confine my winter sports prowess to driving on icy roads and shoveling the walk.
Lately though, I've been spending a lot of time at the ice skating rink. No friends, I'm not thinking I'll be the next Apolo Anton Ohno or Sarah Hughes, but my daughters think they might. The Olympic dividend at our household has been enrolling our children in Salt Lake County Recreation Department's Learn to Skate program. Our lithe 10-year-old wants to be a short-track speedskater. Our younger daughter, whose build is more like Ohno's than Hughes, is taking figure-skating lessons. From what I read in the Deseret News, so are half the children in the Valley.
Odds are, my children won't become Olympians. Think of all the little girls taking skating lessons across the country. Only three end up on the Olympic podium every four years. If I had enrolled my kids in skating convinced they will become world-class athletes, I'd need a mental-health referral. I'm just happy they've found sports they enjoy, that they're developing some degree of competency and they're getting some exercise to boot.
I can't help but envy them. When I was a kid, we watched the Olympics, too. We marveled at Peggy Fleming and Dorothy Hamill, but it never occurred to us that we, too, could skate. There were no municipal recreation programs in those days. The only facility in my small town, if I dare call it that, was the lawn in city park, which was periodically flooded and allowed to freeze. Since there was no organized instruction or skate rentals, people were left to their devices to figure out how to skate. Many did. Others were injured and didn't give it another chance. I didn't have the nerve to try.
The skating program in which our daughters are enrolled is a progressive program. No one learns "sink or swim." The atmosphere is controlled but nurturing. It's been a great experience for them.
What a remarkable Olympic Games legacy that Utah children have all of these wonderful facilities to experience various winter sports.
But what's funny, the Olympic dream hasn't confined itself to venues. Immediately following the Games, I noticed an uptick in the number of kids in my surrounding neighborhood playing street hockey in their roller blades.
One friend told me that his son spends hours in the driveway perfecting his hockey shot. The boy is in 3rd-grade.
I used to think the motto of the Salt Lake Games was kind of hokey. "Light the fire within."
But from what I've seen, it's an apt description. The Games gave children permission to stretch themselves, dream a little. I think of the locals who made us proud during these Games, those who medaled and those who didn't. How refreshing that our children have, for the most part, positive role models in Olympians.
Marjorie Cortez is a Deseret News editorial writer. E-mail: marjorie@desnews.com.
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April 6, 2002
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