Leaving behind Tim Hortons at the Olympics
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Change management & wellness
This is the view that greets me most mornings as I start my volunteer shift as a NOC assistant for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics.
Tim Hortons on the sidelines. Cups of caffeine left behind, lined up along the garbage can, as we weave our way through security into the athlete’s village. No liquids allowed.
There’s a million reasons to celebrate… the Olympics, this city, being Canadian.
The Olympics have taken over. We find ourselves cheering for unfamiliar sports (who invented the skeleton race anyway?). We burst into singing the Canadian anthem with pride and spontaneity.
Love them or hate them we’re immersed. Schedules run amok. Routines are out the window. Familiar traffic routes are no more.
I have to concentrate to figure out what day it is and what time of day it is. The other day I jumped out of bed at 5:37 am shouting expletives because I thought I’d overslept and missed my 5:35 bus which would take my sleepy butt to my next volunteer shift.
That is until a sleepy husband reminded me I was on the night shift.
When were you last immersed in something, when up became down and right became left? And thinking of those lonely Tim Horton cups, what did you have to leave behind in order to move forward?
Tags: 2010 olympics, celebrate, change management, olympics, perspective, routine, tim hortons, time, vancouver
February 20th, 2010 at 8:41 am
Hi Leanne! Glad to get your take of it all. Hope you run into Jon Montgomery Skeleton Olympic Gold who is from here – Russell. So happy for him and his family! It has been wonderful to watch so much here at home. BC is doing a great job!!!! What an undertaking. Hi to your family!
February 20th, 2010 at 12:39 pm
Hi Katherine- thanks for your comment. Much appreciated. So great to have a grown boy gleaming with gold! Off to volunteer this afternoon – part of what I do is allocate the victory ceremony tickets which is fun. Will say hi to all and back at you; please say hi to everyone for us.
February 28th, 2010 at 10:39 am
nice post. thanks.
March 8th, 2010 at 9:14 am
Sounds exciting – and tiring.
No liquids allowed? Worried about sneaking steroids into a double-double … or more world class security? It’s interesting to me that we are told we require such a vast security apparatus to watch sports and have a party. I think a lot has changed since Lillehammer and the king mingling with the parka-clad masses.
March 8th, 2010 at 10:00 pm
Hi Gary; yes it was a bit of both. It makes me wonder what the future will bring if we’ve come this ‘far’ from Lillehammer. Also reminds of the story one Olympian told us during training, of how at a past Olympics, she went off into the bushes near the top of the ski run to relieve herself and before she could do the deed was interrupted by a man in all white with tree bushes on his head saying ‘uh, errr, thought you should know I’m here’.