FASHION OF OLYMPIC PROPORTIONS
Not long ago the Super Bowl appeared on television with the largest viewing office in its 50 year history, nearly 160 Million people tuning in to watch the spectacle.
Sure most of them were watching to see the actual football game, but some turned on hoping to glimpse the halos of some of the legendary commercials of the past, and still others, like myself, tuned in to watch the half-time show featuring one of the greatest rock-and-roll bands of all time, The Who. Also adding to the melodrama was the fact that one of the times was the New Orleans Saints, and many people were rooting for this underdog team whose city was still reeling from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina just a few short years ago. What glory, what drama that the Saints wound up winning the game in triumphant fashion!
Not long after the summer Olympics captivated the hearts and minds of hundreds of millions of people throughout the planet. Once again a record number of viewers took to the airwaves to cheer on their country or their favorite individual athletes. And once again, while some were there to enjoy the sports themselves, still others were captivated by the spectacle of the opening and closing ceremonies, the back-stories of the players and even the majesty of the colorful costumes and uniforms that the contestants brought to the universal stage.
And more recently the annual Academy Awards took center stage on the international theater. This time, as in most years past, it seemed like there was more interest and excitement in the red carpet gala then in the actual broadcast of the awards presentation itself. Viewers couldn’t wait till the limousines pulled up to the Kodak Theater dispensing there host of celebrities wearing the latest in couture or their adorning accessories.
Why the fascination with athletes, actors and actresses? Why the continual magnification of their lives and life styles? Is it the yearning for us to desire to be something we are not or to have something that most of us can never have? Is the glamour of the world stage something that calls to us from our mundane world becoming to lure us to some unknown forbidden and foreign land where we think life will be somehow more daring and precious then the world we inhabit? Are the trappings of fame and success, so elusive to us and so remote from our existence, something that we believe would ultimately make us more happy, more fulfilled?
Whatever the reason, I propose that it is something else going one here. Perhaps it is the connection to humanity that encourages us to check in with the world from time to time. Perhaps knowing that hundreds of millions of people, not only from America but from countries around the planet –– some whose names we have never even heard of and whose position on a map can only be found by using a global positioning satellite –– even the inhabitants of these strange lands are tuning in at the same time that we are........ Admiring the pageantry, sharing the camaraderie with their friends and family in their homes or local taverns, wagering who will win the trophy, capture the medal or bring home that little gold statue known as Oscar.
In this world of division and derision it is nice to stop once in a while and put all of our grievances and differences aside and to concentrate instead on what makes us sane and similar. We might think a dress worn by a movie star in the pre-show clip looks hideous and our counterpart in the Far East might think it looks gorgeous. We might ooh and ahh at the jewelry dripping from head-to-tow on the latest ingénue. While another might find it pretentious and over-done; but in the end we are all engrossed in the sheer magnitude of it all and yes, in the sheer folly as well.
And the fact that we can step outside of our stressful, complicated lives for a moment and with a billion people around the world set aside our pride and our prejudices -- to acknowledge the nobility of sport, revel in the beauty and nature of majestic mountains and dream of the possibilities of stars and stardom -- for those few moments when the world stands still and we truly are all one, these truly are times of Olympic proportions.